William Eggleston Quotes

I love the idea I can go off with a single camera and a few rolls of film unencumbered... I was not interested in the illusion of reality, I wanted to get close to what was happening.

I've been taking pictures of wherever I go, or on planes, whatever.

I do what I feel, that's all. I am an ordinary photographer working for his own pleasure. That's all I've ever done.

You see someone like maybe William Eggleston. William doesn't even really talk about what he does; he just wants to make these images. He kind of hovers around a location and extracts these images.

I guess I've shot about 40,000 negatives and of these I have about 800 pictures I like.

...my camera is my friend, and I take it everywhere.

Darkroom work had, after all, never interested me except as a means to an end; the place I wanted to be was outside in the light.

I have never taken a picture for any other reason than that at that moment it made me happy to do so.

When I was younger I used to be really into photography, and I still am, I just don't really get to do it besides taking my own artists photos and stuff like that.

A person cannot learn to be a photographer. He can only cultivate what he already has. I try to make people aware that they have something very precious to cultivate.

It's always more comforting to know that in any given corner of any room or any location you're on, you can make a photograph that you'll appreciate.

The thing about being a photographer that's so cool is that you get to participate, but you also get to disappear. The camera is in front of your face all the time.

I usually bring a point and shoot with me so I can go out on the weekends and shoot a bit. I used to bring more cameras, but I'm also an Ebay nut so sometimes I'll order something if I'm really pining for it when I'm on location.

Always remember to make room to shoot what you love. It's the only way to keep your heart beating as a photographer.

I just [take pictures] because the camera is something to carry around in my pocket.

I do not want [photography] explained to me in terms of... formulas, learned, but so hopelessly unsatisfying. I do not want my butterfly stuck on a pin and put in a glass case. I want to see the sunlight on its wings as it flits from flower to flower and I don't care a rap what its Latin name may be.

I have no interest in being famous. I just want to make famous photographs.

I suddenly understood that photography can fix eternity in a moment. It is the only photo that influenced me. There is such intensity in this image, such spontaneity, such joie de vivre, such miraculousness, that even today it still bowls me over.

I started photography more or less by accident when I was already 27. I was taken on as an assistant by a photographer who was a friend of a friend and I very quickly understood the potential of expression in photography.

To see life. To see the world. To watch the faces of the poor, and the gestures of the proud. To see strange things. Machines, armies, multitudes, and shadows in the jungle. To see, and to take pleasure in seeing. To see and be instructed. To see and be amazed. (Describing the powers of photography; written for the launch of LIFE Magazine, 1936.)

I think the camera is a wonderful machine, don't you? And not to take photographs in this century is crazy.

When I’m behind a camera I forget I exist.

I think I can do whatever I want with fiction, but the more documentary it is, the better it will be because that's what I'm good at. I'm good at observing people's behavior and putting these unspoken things into movie contexts in ways that other people can sometimes miss.

When assignments were over, photography continued. One of the primary reasons it did was that I wanted and needed to have fresh work. Also, it's very stimulating to be around non-professional photographers. They're the ones with the purest flame burning about their photography. I appreciate that.