For A Photographer, The First 70 Years

The Photographer Must Be Absorbent - Like A Blotter, Allow Himself To Be Permeated By The Poetic Moment... His Technique Should Be Like An Animal Function... He Should Act Automatically.

I Prefer My Hesitations, My False Paths, My Stammering, To A Preconceived Idea.

A Memory From My Youth Comes Back To Me. You Go Into The Woods On A Bike, With A Girl. There Is The Smell Of Heather, You Can Hear The Wind In The Fir Trees, You Don't Dare Tell Her About Your Love, But You Feel Happy, As If You Were Floating Above The Ground. Then You Look At The Clouds Beyond The Trees And They Are Fleeting. And You Know That Within An Hour You'll Have To Go Home, That Tomorrow Will Be A Working Day. You Wish You Could Stop That Moment Forever, But You Can't, It Is Bound To End. So You Take A Photo, As If To Challenge Time.

Some Days The Mere Fact Of Seeing Feels Like Perfect Happiness... You Feel So Rich You Long To Share Your Jubilation With Others. The Memory Of Such Moments Is My Most Precious Possession. Maybe Because There've Been So Few Of Them. A Hundredth Of A Second Here, A Hundredth Of A Second There-- Even If You Put Them End To End They Still Only Add Up To One, Two, Perhaps Three Seconds Snatched From Eternity.

Life Is Short. Forgive Quickly. Kiss Slowly.