JIM GOLDBERG

I have the great privilege of being both witness and storyteller. Intimacy, trust and intuition guide my work.

Since 1970, I've been using text and ephemera as well as photographs in order to tell stories of one kind or another. There's a thread that runs through all the work that is to do with bearing witness. The photographs are about asking questions, though, not answering them.

The photograph is kind of a proof - a proof that I actually met these people, that they actually have lives, and that they're worth considering.

[A photograph] is a part of the evidence. I'm not saying it's the truth - it's part of the evidence.

There are many images which I miss on purpose. I've done too many of them before and photographing them again doesn't change the world, or me.

This was in San Francisco, in 1987. A bunch of kids were camped out in the Riviera Hotel - boy hustlers and their sugar daddy. One boy, Tank, showed us his gun. 'It's not loaded,' he said. He pointed the gun to his head, then out the window, and then to the ceiling. When the gun was pointed to the ceiling, he pulled the trigger and it went off. The gun was loaded after all.

Before I even took pictures I knew that I wanted to have them as hard copy memories.

My only agenda is to bring attention to otherwise ignored and shunned lives.

It's always good to find things that you haven't found before.

In Europe, I am an outsider. I don't really understand anything that I am seeing. I can be welcomed into people's homes, I can be met with suspicion, I can be taken somewhere else altogether. There is always wonderment there for me, even if the person I am photographing may not see it or be aware of it.

Every single immigrant is part of a larger history that needs to be communicated in all its ambivalences and complexities.

My only agenda is to bring attention to otherwise ignored and shunned lives.

In order to figure this artmaking stuff out, it's trial and error and experimentation, and takes some time and hard thinking. Putting work out in many forms and stages is an extension of how I see things. I feel the art process is best served when it invites comments and constructive criticism from people.

It's always good to find things that you haven't found before.

In Europe, I am an outsider. I don't really understand anything that I am seeing. I can be welcomed into people's homes, I can be met with suspicion, I can be taken somewhere else altogether. There is always wonderment there for me, even if the person I am photographing may not see it or be aware of it.

I'm not a politically radical person. In fact, I'm much more interested in being radical aesthetically.

I use my intuition. I tell my students: use your brains, but also use another part of yourself.

Since 1970, I've been using text and ephemera as well as photographs in order to tell stories of one kind or another. There's a thread that runs through all the work that is to do with bearing witness. The photographs are about asking questions, though, not answering them.

Before I even took pictures I knew that I wanted to have them as hard copy memories.

This was in San Francisco, in 1987. A bunch of kids were camped out in the Riviera Hotel - boy hustlers and their sugar daddy. One boy, Tank, showed us his gun. 'It's not loaded,' he said. He pointed the gun to his head, then out the window, and then to the ceiling. When the gun was pointed to the ceiling, he pulled the trigger and it went off. The gun was loaded after all.

There are many images which I miss on purpose. I've done too many of them before and photographing them again doesn't change the world, or me.

[A photograph] is a part of the evidence. I'm not saying it's the truth - it's part of the evidence.

I have the great privilege of being both witness and storyteller. Intimacy, trust and intuition guide my work.

The photograph is kind of a proof - a proof that I actually met these people, that they actually have lives, and that they're worth considering.