Quote

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.

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
Teacher
Specific
Clear
Model
Hard
Awful
Going
Photograph
Made
Finally
World
Models
People
Photography
General
Terribly

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I really believe there are things nobody would see if I didn't photograph them.
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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.
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The thing that's important to know is that you never know. You're always sort of feeling your way.
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Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats.
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You see someone on the street, and essentially what you notice about them is the flaw.
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It would be beautiful to photograph the winners of everything from Nobel to booby prize, clutching trophy, or money or certificate, solemn or smiling or tear stained or bloody, on the precarious pinnacle of the human landscape.
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If I didn't have a camera, the things I do would be crazy.
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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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If you scrutinize reality closely enough, if in some way you really, really get to it, it becomes fantastic.
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Nothing is ever the same as they said it was.
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Everybody has that thing where they need to look one way but they come out looking another way and that's what people observe.
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A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know.
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These are characters in a fairy tale for grown-ups. Wouldn't it be lovely? Yes.
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Lately I've been struck with how I really love what you can't see in a photograph. An actual physical darkness. And it's very thrilling for me to see darkness again.
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It's important to take bad pictures. It's the bad ones that have to do with what you've never done before. They can make you recognize something you hadn't seen in a way that will make you recognize it when you see it again.
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There's a quality of legend about freaks. Like a person in a fairy tale who stops you and demands that you answer a riddle.
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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
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I think the most beautiful inventions are the ones you don't think of.
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Nothing is ever the same as they said it was. It's what I've never seen before that I recognize.
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