Pieter Hugo Quotes

A lot of my inspiration is reactionary to images I see in the media.

I grew up in a middle to upper-class house with fairly liberal sentiments, but to me it was always very obvious that the society I grew up in was not ideal and needed to change. Since I was a kid it was apparent it was going to change. It wasn't sustainable the way it was going on.

I always have the feeling that I'm sitting around not doing anything with my life. A little Calvinist guilt that I should be more productive.

It's quite scary when academics start dictating to artists that they should be politically correct or follow certain rules of behavior - which means we have to start making dishonest work, which means it becomes didactic and propaganda in nature.

I have a taste for the macabre. I really am not drawn to imagery that is pretty, things that are just pretty. I’m drawn to things that challenge you, that make you nervous, that make you uncomfortable.

Photography has always been a struggle for me to take seriously as an art form.