Germaine Krull
[Photographer, b. 1897, Wilda, East Prussia, Germany (now Poland), d. 1985, Wetzlar, Germany.]
The camera need not invent, manipulate or fool. It does not paint, nor does it imagine. The photographer is a witness, the witness of his time.
The true photographer is the witness of the everyday; he reports. That his eye does not always focus on what he sees three feet above the ground is natural. But that he focuses consistently on the ground, on today’s ground, on this morning’s ground, or on the ground of this day so beautiful that he forgets what day it is. The world. The world of his time.
The most important skill of the photographer is to know how to see. Yes, one sees through one’s eyes but the same world seen through different eyes is no longer the same world; it’s the world seen through that individual’s eye. With just one click, the lens captures the exterior world at the same time it captures the photographer’s inner world.
(1931)
