Henri Cartier-Bresson
[Photographer and painter, b. 1908, Chanteloup, France, d. 2004, Paris.]
Inside movement there is one moment in which the elements are in balance. Photography must seize the importance of this moment and hold immobile the equilibrium of it.
Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre
[Artist and one of the originators of photography, b. 1787, Cormeilles-en-Parisis, Val-d'Oise, France, d. 1851, Bry-sur-Marne, France.]
I have seized the light. I have arrested its flight.
Barbara Morgan
[Photographer, b. 1900, Buffalo, Kansas, d. 1992, North Tarrytown, New York.]
Movement of contemporary life cannot be thought of without the machine. Our viewpoint is through a windshield, through reflected images on plate glass, blurred snatches through an elevator door. We watch quilted land patterns slowly shift far below our propeller blur, and the vibrating wing tip. Time is cogged, margins tightened, spirit is pressured. Pavement is a child's backyard and the moon is less familiar than a street lamp. If it takes a thief to catch a thief, the camera is the machine to catch the machine age.
Jean Cocteau
[Writer, poet, artist, and filmmaker, b. 1889, Maisons-Lafitte, France, d. 1963, Milly-la-Foret, France.]
Nothing is more intriguing than a still photograph in the middle of a motion picture... Just as an accident is a cry changed into silence and not a silence after a cry, photography is speed rendered motionless...
Annette Messager
[Artist, b. 1943, Berck-sur-Mer, France, lives in Paris.]
I can see today that the same sort of issues lie behind taxidermy and photography. Taxidermy consists in preserving a bird in full flight... In the same way, photography halts and freezes motion and life.
Leonard Freed
[Photographer, b. 1929, Brooklyn, New York, d. 2006, Garrison, New York.]
Photographing is an emotional thing, a graceful thing. Photography allows me to wander with a purpose.
Robert Rauschenberg
[Artist, b. 1925, Port Arthur, Texas, d. 2008, Captiva Island, Florida.]
One gets as much information as a witness of activity from a fleeting glance, like a quick look, sometimes in motion, as one does staring at the subject. Because even if you remain stationary, your mind wanders, and it’s that kind of activity that I would like to get into the photograph.
Paul Virilio
[Writer and theorist, b. 1932, Paris, lives in La Rochelle, France.]
To regain our liberty (and our distance), we must slow the images down.
