Alfred Stieglitz
Alfred Stieglitz
Alfred Stieglitzwas an American photographer and modern art promoter who was instrumental over his fifty-year career in making photography an accepted art form. In addition to his photography, Stieglitz is known for the New York art galleries that he ran in the early part of the 20th century, where he introduced many avant-garde European artists to the U.S. He was married to painter Georgia O'Keeffe...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPhotographer
Date of Birth1 January 1864
CountryUnited States of America
Let me here call attention to one of the most universally popular mistakes that have to do with photography - that of classing supposedly excellent work as professional, and using the term amateur to convey the idea of immature productions and to excuse atrociously poor photographs.
Before the people at large, and for that matter, the artists themselves, understand what photography really means, as I understand that term, it is essential for them to be taught the real meaning of art.
The fight for photography became my life.
If you can imagine photography in the guise of a woman and you’d ask her what she thought of Stieglitz, she’d say: He always treated me like a gentleman.
As a matter of fact, nearly all the greatest work is being, and has always been done, by those who are following photography for the love of it, and not merely for financial reasons. As the name implies, an amateur is one who works for love.
I am not a painter, nor an artist. Therefore I can see straight, and that may be my undoing.
Photography is my passion.
I have all but killed myself for Photography. My passion for it is greater than ever. It's forty years that I have fought its fight... I am not fighting to make a 'name' for myself. Maybe you have some feeling for what the fight is for. It's a world's fight... All that's born of spirit seems mad in these days of materialism run riot.
Photography as a fad is well-nigh on its last legs, thanks principally to the bicycle craze.
The ability to make a truly artistic photograph is not acquired off-hand, but is the result of an artistic instinct coupled with years of labor.
The arts equally have distinct departments, and unless photography has its own possibilities of expression, separate from those of the other arts, it is merely a process, not an art.
I do not object to retouching, dodging or accentuation as long as they do not interfere with the natural qualities of photographic technique.
Photography my passion, the search for truth, my obsession.
Wherever there is light, one can photograph.