Ray Metzker
[Photographer, b. 1931, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, d. 2014, Philadelphia.]

 Photographers are victims of paradox, tracking the impermanent to make it permanent. 
 I don’t need exotic places to be stimulated. Out of familiarity comes nuance. The more you revisit a subject the more you’re like to discover. 
 I never wanted to make portraits—to photograph celebrities, beautiful people, beautiful landscapes, beautiful buildings, or people in distressing situations.... I have always been interested in everyman—average, ordinary people in everyday situations. 
 What appears in the pictures was the subject’s decision, not mine. I took what they presented—delicate moments—unadorned and unglamorous, yet tender and exquisite. 
 The collection of photographs is a statement about the relationship of my camera and me. 
 I am not an objective reporter. I prefer to go further, to the unstated things of our existence. What I can’t understand and grasp seems to lead me. 
 A lot of my work is about is about events, but I also think a lot of my work is about fragmentation.... You have to break something down in order to have the parts synthesize. 
 When you look at the multiples, you are aware of patterning and so forth, but there is still identifiable subject matter; frequently there are people there; there is a rhythm to those people. 
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