John Berger
[Writer and critic, b. 1926, London, d. 2017, Paris.]
What served in the place of the photograph, before the camera’s invention? The expected answer is the engraving, the drawing, the painting. The more revealing answer might be: memory.
Thomas Demand
[Photographer, b. 1964, Munich, Germany, lives in Los Angeles.]
…if I’m invited to do a photography show, I tend to say no. The medium itself, I find, is a relatively boring context. You would never see a show about acrylic paint.
Gerhard Richter
[Artist, b. 1932, Dresden, lives in Düsseldorf.]
I had had enough of bloody painting, and painting from a photograph seemed to me the most moronic thing that anyone could do.
George Bernard Shaw
[Writer, critic, and dramatist, b. 1856, Dublin, d. 1950, Ayot St. Lawrence, Hertfordshire, England.]
I would willingly exchange every single painting of Christ for one snapshot.
Duane Michals
[Photographer, b. 1932, McKeesport, Pennsylvania, lives in New York.]
People believe in the reality of photographs, but not in the reality of paintings. That gives photographers an enormous advantage. Unfortunately, photographers also believe in the reality of photographs.
Vincent Van Gogh
[Artist, b. 1853, Zundert, Netherlands, d. 1890, Auvers-sur-Oise, France.]
I always think photographs abominable, and I don’t like to have them around, particularly not those of persons I know and love... photographic portraits wither much sooner than we ourselves do, whereas the painted portrait is a thing which is felt, done with love or respect for the human being that is portrayed.
Sigmar Polke
[Painter and photographer, b. 1941, Oels, Silesia, Germany (Now Poland), d. 2010, Cologne, Germany.]
I don’t see a big difference between painting and photography. Moreover, such distinctions mean nothing to me.
Marcel Duchamp
[Artist, b. 1887, Blainville, France, d. 1968, Neilly-sur-Seine, France.]
You know exactly what I think of photography. I would like to see it make people despise painting until something else will make photography unbearable.
(In a letter to Alfred Stieglitz)
