If I only try to solve the problems I set for myself, then I'm limited by what I can conceive of. I can't solve a problem I can't conceive. But if someone else gives me a visual problem, it can be out of the whole realm of my normal practice.
Stephen ShoreTo see something spectacular and recognise it as a photographic possibility is not making a very big leap. But to see something ordinary, something youโd see every day, and recognize it as a photographic possibility - that is what I am interested in.
Stephen ShoreA quote that I like very much comes close to explaining my attitude about taking photographs. โChinese 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.โ
Stephen ShoreThis idea of imposing an order is very interesting to me. Photography is in essence an analytic medium. โฆ In photography, you start with the whole world and every decision you make imposes an order on it. The question is to what extent itโs an idealized order Iโm imposing or is it an order that grows out of what the world looks like.
Stephen ShorePhotography is inherently an analytic discipline. Where a painter starts with a blank canvas and builds a picture, a photographer starts with the messiness of the world and selects a picture. A photographer standing before houses and streets and people and trees and artifacts of a culture imposes an order on the scene - simplifies the jumble by giving it structure. He or she imposes this order by choosing a vantage point, choosing a frame, choosing a moment of exposure, and by selecting a plane of focus.
Stephen Shore