The challenge for me has first been to see things as they are, whether a portrait, a city street, or a bouncing ball. In a word, I have tried to be objective. What I mean by objectivity is not the objectivity of a machine, but of a sensible human being with the mystery of personal selection at the heart of it. The second challenge has been to impose order onto the things seen and to supply the visual context and the intellectual framework - that to me is the art of photography.
Berenice AbbottAbstraction in photography is ridiculous, and is only an imitation of painting. We stopped imitating painters a hundred years ago, so to imitate them in this day and age is laughable.
Berenice AbbottPhotography can never grow up if it imitates some other medium. It has to walk alone; it has to be itself.
Berenice AbbottToday we are confronted with reality on the vastest scale mankind has known and this puts a greater responsibility on the photographer.
Berenice Abbott