It is no accident that the photographer becomes a photographer any more than the lion tamer becomes a lion tamer.

When you are doing a lot of hard fast field work, it's a physical necessity to forget every day. You can't try to remember it in any continuity. You get so burdened if you try to do it the other way. You can't dictate to your material... We found our way in, slid in on the edges. We used our hunches. And it was hard, hard living.

... it came to me that what I had to do was to take pictures and concentrate upon people, only people, all kinds of people, people who paid me and people who didn't.

You put your camera around your neck along with putting on your shoes, and there it is, an appendage of the body that shares your life with you. The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.

I had to get my camera to register things that were more important than how poor they were--their pride, their strength, their spirit.

Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still.

I believe that what we call beautiful is generally a by-product.