No country has ever closely scrutinized itself visually ... I know what we could make of it if people only thought we could dare look at ourselves.

Artists are controlled by the life that beats in them, like the ocean beats on the shore.

The good photograph is not the object, the consequences of the photograph are the objects.

Life, for people, begins to crumble on the edges; they don't realize it.

While there is perhaps a province in which the photograph can tell us nothing more than what we see with our own eyes, there is another in which it proves to us how little our eyes permit us to see.

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.

I many times encountered courage, real courage. Undeniable courage. I've heard it said that that was the highest quality of the human animal. I encountered that many times, in unexpected places. And I have learned to recognize it when I see it.