A quote that I like very much comes close to explaining my attitude about taking photographs. ‘Chinese poetry rarely trespasses beyond the bounds of actuality the great Chinese poets accept the world exactly as they find it in all its terms and with profound simplicity they seldom talk about one thing in terms of another; but are able enough and sure enough as artists to make the ultimately exact terms become the beautiful terms.’

I don't know how much a photograph can add to a biography, the way a film or writing or narrative medium could. Because it's a frozen image.

I discovered that this camera was the technical means in photography of communicating what the world looks like in a state of heightened awareness. And it's that awareness of really looking at the everyday world with clear and focused attention that I'm interested in.

I'm always interested in finding new aesthetic problems to deal with and challenge myself, even if the aesthetic problem is one of content.

I think most serious photographers understand that there's this large gap between the world and how the world looks through a photograph.

I have to be reminded, “’It’s your son’s birthday party. Bring a camera.’ And then, when I’m there, ‘Take a picture,’ because it doesn’t occur to me to use it as this memorializing thing.

Photographers have to impose order, bring structure to what they photograph. It is inevitable. A photograph without structure is like a sentence without grammar-it is incomprehensible, even inconceivable.