The camera is for us a tool, not a pretty mechanical toy ... people think far too much about techniques and not enough about seeing.
Henri Cartier-BressonRead
Photographers deal in things which are continuously vanishing.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects the transient nature of moments captured in photography.
Henri Cartier-Bresson emphasizes that photographers work with fleeting moments that are constantly disappearing, highlighting the importance of capturing the essence of life as it occurs. This observation suggests that photography is not just about the images created but also about the impermanence and beauty of life itself, as every moment is unique and quickly becomes part of the past.
Themes
PhotographyTransienceMomentsLifeArt
In practice
Example use cases
Using this quote during a photography exhibition to reflect on the essence of captured moments.
More from Henri Cartier-Bresson
All quotes βThe most difficult thing for me is a portrait. You have to try and put your camera between the skin of a person and his shirt.
Henri Cartier-BressonRead
Photography has not changed since its origin except in its technical aspects, which for me are not important.
Henri Cartier-BressonRead
Photographier: c'est mettre sur la meme ligne de mire la tete, l'oeil et le coeur.
Henri Cartier-BressonRead
Above all, I craved to seize the whole essence, in the confines of one single photograph, of some situation that was in the process of unrolling itself before my eyes.
Henri Cartier-BressonRead
Pictures, regardless of how they are created and recreated, are intended to be looked at. This brings to the forefront not the technology of imaging, which of course is important, but rather what we might call the eyenology (seeing).
Henri Cartier-BressonRead
Similar quotes
The important thing is not to be too comfortable when you're writing. Noise in the street? That's good. The computer goes down? That's good. All these things are good. It has to be a little bit of a struggle.
E. L. DoctorowRead
Like every novelist, I fantasise about film. Novelists are not equipped to make a movie, in my opinion. They make their own movie when they write: they're casting, they're dressing the scene, they're working out where the energy of the scene is coming from, and they're also relying tremendously on the creative imagination of the reader.
John Le CarreRead
And, since the model he faithfully copies is not going to be hung up next to the picture, since the picture is going to be there on its own, it is of no interest whether it is an accurate copy of the model.
Lucian FreudRead
It wasn't until I went to my first comic convention while I was in high school that I got to see actual comic book artists and original artwork in real life, up close. That was when I first realized that this is what I wanted to do for a living.
George PerezRead
It is necessary to write, if the days are not to slip emptily by. How _x000D_ else, indeed, to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment?
Vita Sackville-WestRead
The writer has no responsibility other than to jack off in bed alone and write a good page.
Charles BukowskiRead