Photography can never grow up if it imitates some other medium. It has to walk alone; it has to be itself.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of originality in photography, suggesting it should not simply mimic other art forms.
Berenice Abbott's quote reflects the idea that photography, as an art form, must develop its own unique identity rather than relying on the styles or techniques of other mediums such as painting or film. It advocates for authenticity and creative independence, encouraging photographers to explore their own vision and voice in their work.
In practice
During a photography exhibition, this quote can be used to inspire budding photographers to find their own style.
To chart a course, one must have a direction. In reality, the eye is no better than the philosophy behind it. The photographer creates, evolves a better, a more selective, more acute seeing eye by looking ever more sharply at what is going on in the world.
Actually, documentary pictures include every subject in the world - good, bad, indifferent. I have yet to see a fine photograph which is not a good document.
Does not the very word 'creative' mean to build, to initiate, to give out, to act - rather than to be acted upon, to be subjective? Living photography is positive in its approach, it sings a song of life - not death.
The camera is no more an instrument of preservation, the image is.
Photography helps people to see.
Some people are still unaware that reality contains unparalleled beauties. The fantastic and unexpected, the ever-changing and renewing is nowhere so exemplified as in real life itself.
Drag is literally so ancient that it predates modern understanding of gender, of transness, of queerness. Drag predates modern ideas of gender, of theater at all. Drag predates the word 'drag' itself.
One can rightly speak of an evolution in plastic art. It is of the greatest importance to note this fact, for it reveals the true way of art - the only path along which we can advance.
I don't care about being a pioneer. People act like it would be cool to be a pioneer. I'm okay to be looked at as that, but it's just that we don't get transmitted our cultural heritage as women artists.
There's always a need at a critical time for poetry.
But in many orders of beauty, particularly those of the finer arts, it is requisite to employ much reasoning, in order to feel the proper sentiment; and a false relish may frequently be corrected by argument and reflection. There are just grounds to conclude, that moral beauty partakes of this latter species, and demands the assistance of our intellectual faculties, in order to give it a suitable influence on the human mind.
Ever since I was a kid, I always wanted to play music that I liked, and even when I was in cover bands when I was a teenager we only played cover tunes that we liked. That was the simple morality that I grew up with.
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