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I don't know what good composition is.... Sometimes for me composition has to do with a certain brightness or a certain coming to restness and other times it has to do with funny mistakes. There's a kind of rightness and wrongness and sometimes I like rightness and sometimes I like wrongness.

Diane Arbus

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Diane Arbus
Age: 48 †
Born: 1923
Born: March 14
Died: 1971
Died: July 26
Fashion Photographer
Photographer
New York City
New York
Diane Nemerov
Diane Nemerov Arbus
Diane née Nemerov
Diane nee Nemerov
Good
Photography
Like
Coming
Mistake
Wrongness
Times
Rightness
Funny
Brightness
Certain
Composition
Sometimes
Photographer
Kind
Mistakes

More quotes by Diane Arbus

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...I would never choose a subject for what it means to me. I choose a subject and then what I feel about it, what it means, begins to unfold.
Diane Arbus
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Photography was a license to go wherever I wanted and to do what I wanted to do.
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We've all got an identity. You can't avoid it. It's what's left when you take everything else away.
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Everything is so superb and breathtaking. I am creeping forward on my belly like they do in war movies.
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Taking pictures is like tiptoeing into the kitchen late at night and stealing Oreo cookies.
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If you scrutinize reality closely enough, if in some way you really, really get to it, it becomes fantastic.
Diane Arbus
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One thing I would never photograph is a dog lying in the mud.
Diane Arbus
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The camera is a kind of license.
Diane Arbus
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Take pictures of what you fear.
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I mean, if you've ever spoken to someone with two heads, you know they know something you don't.
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These are characters in a fairy tale for grown-ups. Wouldn't it be lovely? Yes.
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There are an awful lot of people in the world and it's going to be terribly hard to photograph all of them... It was my teacher Lisette Model who finally made it clear to me that the more specific you are, the more general it will be.
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One thing that struck me early is that you don’t put into a photograph what’s going to come out. Or, vice versa, what comes out is not what you put in.
Diane Arbus
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A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know.
Diane Arbus
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One of the risks of appearing in public is the likelihood of being photographed.
Diane Arbus
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There's a kind of power thing about the camera. I mean everyone knows you've got some edge. You're carrying some magic which does something to them. It fixes them in a way.
Diane Arbus
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The camera is cruel, so I try to be as good as I can to make things even.
Diane Arbus
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You see someone on the street, and essentially what you notice about them is the flaw.
Diane Arbus
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I never have taken a picture I've intended. They're always better or worse.
Diane Arbus
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I'm very little drawn to photographing people that are known or even subjects that are known. They fascinate me when I've barely heard of them.
Diane Arbus