What has changed is that when I photographed, most people that I photographed didn't have the right of refusal on their work. It would take a Marilyn Monroe at her height to be able to dictate that.

Recording sessions were stimulating to photograph, because everything was in motion: the subject, the musicians, the technicians and the photographer. You needed fast reflexes to keep up with moving targets, and sensitivity and skill to get the pictures while keeping out of the performers' eyeline so as not to break their concentration.

I look for a sense of reality with everything I did. I didn't work in a studio, I didn't light anything. I found a way of working which pleased me because I didn't have to frighten people with heavy equipment. It was that little black box and me and £5 worth of film in my pocket or maybe it was only £2 in those days.

What you need to be a good photographer is an overwhelming curiosity and a good digestion.

I didn't want to be a woman photographer. That would limit me. I wanted to be a photographer who was a woman, with all the world open to my camera.

If you are careful with people, they will offer you part of themselves. That is the big secret.

I have been poor and I wanted to document poverty; I had lost a child and I was obsessed with birth; I was interested in politics and I wanted to know how it affected our lives; I am a woman and I wanted to know about women.