Vittorio Storaro
[Cinematographer, b. 1940, Rome, Italy, lives in Rome.]
We are all made of flesh, of matter. And at the end, this matter is dissolved in light, and transformed into energy. It’s the Einstein formula. Energy is nothing but matter that is moving at the speed of light, squared.
George Eastman
[Inventor and industrialist, b. 1854, Waterville, New York, d. 1932, Rochester, New York.]
Light makes photography. Embrace light. Admire it. Love it. But above all, know light.
Wynn Bullock
[Photographer, b. 1902, Chicago, Illinois, d. 1975, Monterey, California.]
My thinking has been deeply affected by the belief that all things are some form of radiant energy. Light is perhaps the most profound truth in the universe.
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.
Franz Kafka
[Writer, b. 1883, Prague, d. 1924, Prague.]
Photography concentrates one’s eye on the superficial. For that reason it obscures the hidden life which glimmers through the outlines of things like a play of light and shade. One can’t catch that even with the sharpest lens. One has to grope for it by feeling.
Milan Kundera
[Writer, b. 1929, Brno, Bohemia (now Czechoslovakia), lives in Paris.]
Seeing is limited by two borders: Strong light, which blinds, and total darkness.
Manuel Álvarez Bravo
[Photographer, b. 1902, Mexico City, d. 2002, Mexico City.]
I think that light and shadow have exactly the same duality that exists between life and death.
James Welling
[Photographer, b. 1951, Hartford, Connecticut, lives in Los Angeles.]
... I began showing the black border of the negative as part of the image, something I’d never done before. I began to realize that the edge of the negative represents the shadow of the camera, the opaqueness of matter. It casts a shadow on the negative, so it’s a photogram as well.
