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While we cannot describe its appearance (the equivalent), we can define its function. When a photograph functions as an Equivalent we can say that at that moment, and for that person the photograph acts as a symbol or plays the role of a metaphor for something that is beyond the subject photographed.

Minor White

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Minor White
Age: 67 †
Born: 1908
Born: July 9
Died: 1976
Died: June 24
Photographer
University Teacher
Minneapolis
Minnesota
Minor Martin White
Play
Subjects
Plays
Photographed
Something
Beyond
Acts
Equivalent
Roles
Photographer
Functions
Moment
Appearance
Symbol
Moments
Photograph
Metaphor
Cannot
Subject
Describe
Persons
Function
Define
Person
Role
Symbols

More quotes by Minor White

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The photographer projects himself into everything he sees, identifying himself with everything in order to know it and to feel it better.
Minor White
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I'm always mentally photographing everything as practice.
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When I look at pictures I have made, I have forgotten what I saw in front of the camera and respond only to what I am seeing in the photographs.
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We could teach photography as a way to make a living, and best of all, somehow to get students to experience for themselves photography as a way of life.
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Let the subject generate its own photographs. Become a camera.
Minor White
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To engage a sequence, we keep in mind the photographs on either side of the one in our eye.
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Students were taught by doing.
Minor White
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No matter how slow the film, Spirit always stands still long enough for the photographer It has chosen.
Minor White
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Watching the way the current moves a blade of grass - sometimes I've seen that happen and it has just turned me inside out.
Minor White
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A very receptive state of mind... not unlike a sheet of film itself - seemingly inert, yet so sensitive that a fraction of a second's exposure conceives a life in it.
Minor White
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In putting images together I become active, and excitement is of another order - synthesis overshadows analysis.
Minor White
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There's no particular class of photograph that I think is any better than any other class. I'm always and forever looking for the image that has spirit! I don't give a damn how it got made.
Minor White
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Reaching a 'creative' state of mind thru positive action is considered preferable to waiting for 'inspiration'.
Minor White
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If I have anything to give you through camera, it must be of myself. … A gnawing burns inside … to make something of myself worth giving.
Minor White
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When I looked at things for what they are I was fool enough to persist in my folly and found that each photograph was a mirror of my Self.
Minor White
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One should not only photograph things for what they are but for what else they are.
Minor White
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Sometimes we work so fast that we don't really understand what's going on in front of the camera. We just kind of sense that, 'Oh my God, it's significant!' and photograph impulsively while trying to get the exposure right. Exposure occupies my mind while intuition frames the images.
Minor White
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When gifts are given to me through my camera, I accept them graciously.
Minor White
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Photographers who come up with power never get accused of imitating anyone else even though they photograph the same broom, same street, same portraits.
Minor White
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Be still with yourself until the object of your attention affirms your presence.
Minor White