I was always painting when I was a kid. But then when I handled a camera when I was 17, that was it for me. I loved photography. I would work 4 or 5 hours a day. It was like a calling.

My idea was that if I took a picture of somebody and years later, or whenever, they would die and if someone wanted to know who this person was, they could take one of these pictures and it would tell who the person was.

I love when people write about something, I learn what I'm doing through the eyes of a good critic, positive or negative. It's still a learning experience.

I believe Michael [Jackson] in a sense is an American martyr. Martyrs are persecuted and Michael was persecuted. Michael was innocent and martyrs are innocent. If you go on YouTube and watch interviews with Michael, you don't see a crack in the facade. There's this purity and this innocence that continued [throughout his life].

The minute you point a camera at something, you are manipulating the image, because you are cropping out whatever is to the left and right of it. The minute you put a light on someone, you are manipulating the image.

I have no interest in being famous. I just want to make famous photographs.

The matriarchal society 1300 years ago in Egypt was a peaceful society; that's where you had no war for thousands of years! When they switched to patriarchal society, when the male energy ruled, we became obsessed with the greed. Now we are in this time of intense greed!