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Photography is pretty simple stuff. You just react to what you see, and take many, many pictures.

Elliott Erwitt

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Elliott Erwitt
Age: 96
Born: 1928
Born: July 26
Film Director
Journalist
Photographer
Photojournalist
Paris
France
André S. Solidor
Elio Romano Ervitz
Andre S. Solidor
Elliot Erwitt
Take
Many
React
Pictures
Photographer
Photography
Pretty
Simple
Stuff

More quotes by Elliott Erwitt

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Covering a historic event is perfectly legitimate. It's not sneaking into somebody's boudoir... These people belong to history, and not to record that if you have the opportunity would be wrong.
Elliott Erwitt
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It's just seeing - at least the photography I care about. You either see or you don't see. The rest is academic. Anyone can learn how to develop. It's how you organize what you see into a picture.
Elliott Erwitt
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I like things that have to do with what is real, elegant, well presented and without excessive style. In other words, just fine observation.
Elliott Erwitt
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I see no difference between my pictures that people consider amusing and the rest. To me, it's all serious work - they're just a reaction to what I see. I don't leave this apartment in the morning and say to myself 'Today I'm going to be funny and tomorrow I'm going to be sad.'
Elliott Erwitt
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I'm almost violent about that stuff - electronic manipulation of pictures. I think it's an abomination. I reject it all. I mean, it's OK for selling corn flakes or automobiles or for taking pimples out of Elizabeth Taylor's face, but it undermines the thing that photography is about, which is about observation and not about manipulation of images.
Elliott Erwitt
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In those simpler days, you could just take pictures of movie stars and show them the way they were, as normal human beings. And if I felt part of any movement at the time, it was just to do that - to be journalistic and photograph what is, rather than what is made up.
Elliott Erwitt
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Now very often events are set up for photographers... The weddings are orchestrated about the photographers taking the picture, because if it hasn't been photographed it doesn't really exist.
Elliott Erwitt
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I like museums in Berlin a lot, especially in the eastern part. They're extraordinarily good.
Elliott Erwitt
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Everybody's got to do something... I'd been on my own since an early age and I thought I better find something to do to buy biscuits and stuff. From high school onwards I was earning my way with photography, one way or another, working in darkrooms and taking pictures of weddings, neighbors' children and so on.
Elliott Erwitt
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It's about time we started to take photography seriously and treat it as a hobby.
Elliott Erwitt
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You must have a visual sense if you want to be a photographer. It is a very subtle thing, this visual business.
Elliott Erwitt
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Balance of light is the problem, not the amount. Balance between shadows and highlights determines where the emphasis goes in the picture...make sure the major light in a picture falls at right angles to the camera.
Elliott Erwitt
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I'm an amateur photographer, apart from being a professional one, and I think maybe my amateur pictures are the better ones.
Elliott Erwitt
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You can find pictures anywhere. It's simply a matter of noticing things and organizing them.
Elliott Erwitt
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Quality … has to do with intention.
Elliott Erwitt
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I've been around so long, most editors think I'm dead.
Elliott Erwitt
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The main thing is to study pictures and stop listening to the pontifictaions of photographers. Photographers aren't oracles of wisdom. If they're good photographers, then take a good look at their pictures - what else do you need?
Elliott Erwitt
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If you've got no responsibility and don't have to generate a certain amount of cash each month, and can live on a shoestring, and are ambitious enough, then you might have a chance. You can be dedicated but that is no guarantee that you'll make it. I rely on a hunch, a little luck, and some cunning.
Elliott Erwitt
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To me, photography is an art of observation. It's about finding something interesting in an ordinary place... I've found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.
Elliott Erwitt
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It's about reacting to what you see, hopefully without preconception. You can find pictures anywhere. It's simply a matter of noticing things and organising them. You just have to care about what's around you and have a concern with humanity and the human comedy.
Elliott Erwitt