There are certain pictures I can never take. We turn on the TV and are smothered with cruelty and suffering and I don't need to add to it. So I just photograph peaceful things. A vase of flowers, a beautiful girl. Sometimes, through a peaceful face, I can bring something important into the world.

The most important thing is to go out and see the stars, not to see them in books.

I think that the photos that we like were made when the photographer knew how to disappear. If there were a secret, certainly that would be it.

There is a word we haven't used yet: virginity... To make a photograph, the plate must be virgin, but your eye as well.

In some way, a photo is like a stolen kiss. In fact a kiss is always stolen, even if the woman is consenting. With a photograph it's the same: always stolen, and still slightly consenting.

A photographer is a witness. He has a moral duty. Every picture must be true and honest. I believe a photographer's strength is his ability to accurately record reality. There are photographers who think they are lucky if they find unusual or special subject. But it is never the subject that is so marvelous. It is how alive and real the photographer can make it.

Taking photographs is not something that happens only in a moment I press the button. It is a full-time occupation. For me there is difference between leisure and work.