Does getting closer to the subject make the photograph more intimate? I'm sure it takes more than that. What comes next? The face, the nude? That's what I'd love to do. Who would even let me do that?

I feel as if most people are pretty much the same within a certain class, due to the schools they attend and the way they are raised.

The idea of the portrait itself is my great love. The questions and answers in it can go on forever and ever. It is what happens in the eyes or with a tilt of the head. I keep going because it's too interesting to stop.

[My advice to a beginning photographer is] sit down with a pencil and paper and think about what your life is about. What you are about. Don't even take a camera into your hands before you figure that out.

I know now that before I take a picture I have to be sure about how I feel about the subjects. What I don't know is if I should explain to them what I'm doing while I'm photographing them.

I've always said that the Europeans subconsciously knew how to pose because of the culture or tradition of having your portrait made. They were surrounded by these portraits, and subconsciously they were already posing for them.

Can you see the deaths, divorces, job losses or changes, disappointments, surprises, and successes on people's faces? Have they been happy, sad, disillusioned, or gratified? I have been trying the single, vertically shot portrait with my 8 x 10 since 1985 and never felt I succeeded in finding what I was looking for.