Photography Deals Exquisitely With Appearances, But Nothing

I Still Find Doing Portraits A Terrific Challenge, But Even Though I've Done Hundreds Of Them, I've Never Stopped Questioning The Very Nature Of Portraiture Because It Deals Exclusively With Appearances. I've Never Believed People Are What They Look Like And Think It's Impossible To Really Know What People Are.

How Foolish Of Me To Believe That It Would Be That Easy. I Had Confused The Appearance Of Trees And Automobiles, And People With A Reality Itself, And Believed That A Photograph Of These Appearances To Be A Photograph Of It. It Is A Melancholy Truth That I Will Never Be Able To Photograph It And Can Only Fail. I Am A Reflection Photographing Other Reflections Within A Reflection. To Photograph Reality Is To Photograph Nothing.

Most Portraits Are Lies. People Are Rarely What They Appear To Be, Especially In Front Of A Camera. You Might Know Me Your Entire Lifetime And Never Reveal Yourself To Me. To Interpret Wrinkles As Character Is Insult Not Insight.

If You Look At A Photograph, And You Think, 'my Isn't That A Beautiful Photograph,' And You Go On To The Next One, Or 'isn't That Nice Light?' So What? I Mean What Does It Do To You Or What's The Real Value In The Long Run? What Do You Walk Away From It With? I Mean, I'd Much Rather Show You A Photograph That Makes Demands On You, That You Might Become Involved In On Your Own Terms Or Be Perplexed By.

The Majority Of Photographers Focus On The Obvious. They Believe And Accept What Their Eyes Tell Them, And Yet Eyes Know Nothing.