I spent a great deal of my life being ignored. I was always very happy that way. Being ignored is a great privilege. That is how I think I learned to see what others do not see and to react to situations differently. I simply looked at the world, not really prepared for anything.

I leave these speculations to others. It’s quite possible that my work represents a search for beauty in the most prosaic and ordinary places. One doesn’t have to be in some faraway dreamland in order to find beauty.

The important thing in life is not what you get, but what you throw out.

I must admit that I am not a member of the ugly school. I have a great regard for certain notions of beauty even though to some it is an old fashioned idea. Some photographers think that by taking pictures of human misery, they are addressing a serious problem. I do not think that misery is more profound than happiness.

Seeing is a neglected enterprise.

Seeing is a neglected enterprise.

If I’d only known which [photographs] would be very good and liked, I wouldn’t have had to do all the thousands of others.

A window covered with raindrops interests me more than a photograph of a famous person.

I have a deep-seated distrust and even contempt for people who are driven by ambition to conquer the world … those who cannot control themselves and produce vast amounts of crap that no one cares about. I find it unattractive. I like the Zen artists: they’d do some work, and then they’d stop for a while.

In order to build a career and to be successful, one has to be determined. One has to be ambitious. I much prefer to drink coffee, listen to music and to paint when I feel like it.

Photography allows you to learn to look and see. You begin to see things you'd never paid attention to.

If I’d only known which [photographs] would be very good and liked, I wouldn’t have had to do all the thousands of others.

I admired a tremendous number of photographers, but for some reason I arrived at a point of view of my own.

I go out to take a walk, I see something, I take a picture. I take photographs. I have avoided profound explanations of what I do.

When we do not know why the photographer has taken a picture and when we do not know why we are looking at it, all of a sudden we discover something that we start seeing. I like this confusion.