Mario Giacomelli Quotes

[My mother] died a few months ago, and when she was dead I kissed her lips. For me it was a beautiful moment. From then on I started living with her, asking her from time to time if she was alright, if she was pleased with me. But these things are far greater than photography, and I probably shouldn't be speaking about them.

Photography is not difficult - as long as you have something to say.

I don't know about other people's cameras. Mine is a thing I had cobbled up, it holds together with tape and is always losing parts. All I need to set is the distance and that other thing - what do you call that other thing?

There are situations that refuse to be photographed. But at other times nothing will stop me, because I know my pictures will not shout against anyone - only against time.

I try to photograph thoughts.

To be sure the landscape can't run away, and yet I always fear that it may. [Sometimes] I must set up my tripod, so I worry that the landscape may disappear the next second and I don't stop keeping an eye on it while I get prepared. Then, when pressing the shutter, I hold my breath. These moments are the greatest joys in my life, as if I were undressing the most beautiful woman in the world - that is, if she will allow herself be undressed. If the photo is a success, it means that she was willing. If not, it has been a lovely dream.

Of course [photography] cannot create, nor express all we want to express. But it can be a witness of our passage on earth, like a notebook.

Nature is a mirror in which I am reflected, because by rescuing this land from sad devastation [through recreating it in photographs], I am in fact trying to save myself from my own inner sadness.