Ansel Adams Quotes
When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.
Ansel Adams
A good photograph is knowing where to stand.
Photography, as a powerful medium of expression and communications, offers an infinite variety of perception, interpretation and execution.
Both the grand and the intimate aspects of nature can be revealed in the expressive photograph. Both can stir enduring affirmations and discoveries, and can surely help the spectator in his search for identification with the vast world of natural beauty and wonder surrounding him.
A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed.
It is my intention to present - through the medium of photography - intuitive observations of the natural world which may have meaning to the spectators.
Myths and creeds are heroic struggles to comprehend the truth in the world.
It is horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save the environment.
The only things in my life that compatibly exists with this grand universe are the creative works of the human spirit.
The whole world is, to me, very much "alive" - all the little growing things, even the rocks. I can't look at a swell bit of grass and earth, for instance, without feeling the essential life - the things going on - within them. The same goes for a mountain, or a bit of the ocean, or a magnificent piece of old wood.
No man has the right to dictate what other men should perceive, create or produce, but all should be encouraged to reveal themselves, their perceptions and emotions, and to build confidence in the creative spirit.
Simply look with perceptive eyes at the world about you, and trust to your own reactions and convictions. Ask yourself: "Does this subject move me to feel, think and dream? Can I visualize a print - my own personal statement of what I feel and want to convey - from the subject before me?
In wisdom gathered over time I have found that every experience is a form of exploration.
These people live again in print as intensely as when their images were captured on old dry plates of sixty years ago... I am walking in their alleys, standing in their rooms and sheds and workshops, looking in and out of their windows. Any they in turn seem to be aware of me.
You don't take a photograph, you make it.
No matter how sophisticated you may be, a large granite mountain cannot be denied - it speaks in silence to the very core of your being.
Sometimes I do get to places just when God's ready to have somebody click the shutter.
There is nothing worse than a brilliant image of a fuzzy concept.
To photograph truthfully and effectively is to see beneath the surfaces and record the qualities of nature and humanity which live or are latent in all things.
Millions of men have lived to fight, build palaces and boundaries, shape destinies and societies; but the compelling force of all times has been the force of originality and creation profoundly affecting the roots of human spirit.
