All language subtitles for 2. Portrait Photography

I think it is important to understand
that.

I didn't like so much

embracing portraiture

as it was a way to sort of

keep the other labels at bay.

I've been doing this for over 45 years,
and it's like, you know,

you get labeled something,

like, when I was rollingson, I was a
rock and roll photographer, and I was

vanny fair, I was a celebrity
photographer.

You know, it's like, I'm just a
photographer.

And I think one of the things I love
about photography

is how

big it is and what latitude it has.

Like, you guys are so attractive.

I mean, it's like this

seriously.

I admit it, because that's just being
young.

I don't know what it is

So, do you know each other in your
classes?

Overlapping?

Because you're different years, right?

A lot of different years.

What?

I just go around and say your name and

tell me what you're here in, and what
you were hoping to do.

A meeka spanning

from Germany.

Originally, I came here last year.

Yeah, but I am.

Because you mentioned photojournalist.

It was.

There was a time when I thought I was
going to go into that direction, but

which direction I voted more
photojournalists.

I realized then that I was much more
interested in documentary and personal

projects and be

the author and not just the fly on the
wall.

I can't hum it.

And yeah, you're right when you say

that photography,

I think in a

really weird time right now, where we
criticize photojournalists

for it's, like, it's, like, it's like a
hate ache for the photojournalist,

it's, like, it's such a great moment
for photojournaism, I mean, is like, to

me, it's the most powerful work being
done right now.

This foot,

I run

to the door to give my New York Times
in the morning, because I still look at

the paper, and I look at the front
page, and I see how the photograph they

use, how they use it, you know, what
placement it has.

I turn into the paper, and the
newspaper itself is actually running

photo stories, you know, inside?

I don't really look at it online,

I do.

Yeah, I look a lot online.

It's not as satisfying as looking

at the paper.

I don't know if

many of you know this, but

while still going to the school to
school here, or the artistsual, I

started working for rolling stone
magazine.

And I was, at that time, life magazine
was still going.

it was.

And photojournalism in life was so
compelling.

Even though I was brought up on Robert,
Robert Frank and carday brazan, I

really wanted to.

I thought, oh, I want to be
photojournalists.

But I did discover, and there are a lot
of reasons why, which would take at least

several days to explain.

But I did come to the same place

where I felt like I had a stronger voice

outside of photojourism,

that if I could,

I'd like having a point of view.

And I, and I thought,

you're supposed to stay relatively
objective

in your journal.

And where is the line

that that would be a whole chapter?

And I'm going to write that down.

Actually, I do want to write, where is
the line?

That's such a good look,

trust me, it's something

that you will fight your whole life.

Where is the line

when you step in, when you step out?

I think if you really are out

on the front lines of, I don't just
mean battlefields, or

that, I think you are compelled to

be more

objective, but you still have

your gut, and your soul are going to

direct a lot of how you photograph.

The other thing is,

when you work, let's say you work for a
newspaper, and you don't mean honest,

or you have control over what gets used.

You will, eventually,

I've been doing this long enough to know

that,

to see the photographs

transforbed and changed.

I

had met Arnold as early as 1976

in South Africa, when he

was filming, pumping, pumping iron with
George butler.

And he was there for the Mr.

Universe, contest there in South Africa.

And he was kind of a show boat.

And he was certainly

bizarre to me, because he was so

big, physically big.

And I just finished the rolling Stones
tour 1975,

and

looking at Mick Jagger for about six
months, this skinny guy.

And then here I was with Arnold
spizinger.

Huge,

very freaky.

It was freaky to me.

It was Diane arbus's time.

It was not

of the earth,

and it was cartoonish to me, quite
honestly.

But there was a whole culture

around it.

And that was kind of fascinating to see
this kind of world of body building.

Went out to Hollywood and began doing
films.

And we were doing a cover story of him
for banny ferre.

Many years of

with him

going over the years.

there were a couple more sittings,

even going up to when he was governor

with Maria schryber.

And I actually did something, I
actually photographed him, I did his

wedding, come to think of it, with
Maria sriver and high asphort,

you know, every now and then

a subject comes along that, you know,
it's going to be

a big deal,

not necessarily to

the magazine, but in this case it was
sekatelin.

And it meant a lot more than just
trying to create a cover.

It was really an emergence

of Caitlin into

her next life.

It was this transition into her next

And it was really seriously, it was in
an honor and a privilege to take part

in that.

I mean, Caitlin really had ideas.

She had basically sequestered herself
in her house.

She hadn't gone out.

It was helping her develop what she was
going to look like

and get her, get her

on the way and down the road.

And I decided that we would do it right
at her house, in her house, and

work there.

And that was a very smart idea, because
everything,

it felt comfortable for her

and proceeded to try different

ideas and different dresses and
different

hair,

he was just literally watching her be
transformed.

The first day, she was very, very
quiet.

This second day, I mean, you're dealing
with an Olympic athlete, and she was,

she was pretty much dragging us along.

The second day, she was on her way.

I thought it was enough that

she would be

transformed, and it was her
announcement,

but she definitely wanted to go further.

I was trying the boost

with a leather jacket, just to show the
kind of transformation.

Because even though she was interested
in looking like a woman,

she had a lot of masculine aspects to
her being the athlete that she is.

And, you know, she still like driving
fast cars and motorcycles and jumping

out of planes.

And she said she still was rough and
tough

girl.

So

I like the idea of the leather jacket
with

the boossier.

Did you know it just wasn't working?

And we eventually pulled the jacket
off.

And there was this very simple

photograph of her.

I was excited about it because I love
the idea of

when you first looked at the cover, at
first glance you would say, who's that

you didn't know who that was.

There's this large history

that I'm very responsible to.

And,

I mean,

sahadi

I have photographs of her that I didn't
really particularly like.

And she died, and I looked at the
pictures,

and I know, oh, her eyes are closed.

She's sitting

in the studio.

I don't love my studio work,

but

I love these.

Suddenly, I love these photographs.

I think the idea that she's

no longer with us,

the weight of that in these
photographs, and I see that a lot

it's offensive to me when I hear people
say, oh, you really got that person

that's it.

Oh, you have their soul.

I mean, bonie,

you have a little bit of someone that
you're trying to sort of represent

on a flat surface, so to speak.

And

just not going to get that.

You know, it doesn't work like that.

I'm thinking about

Alexander fuller.

I have a portrait of her that she looks
like

Dorothea ling's migrant worker.

I mean, she looks so ragged.

And then

there's another photograph of her
standing next to her.

She lives in a yard with her horse, and
she looks

so beautiful.

And they're both her

and I just,

I ran them both.

I struggled.

Which one did I want to run?

I said, this is ridiculous.

I'm just going to run them both.

I did the same thing with Sally Mann.

There's a portrait of her in her

studio,

where she prints her photographs.

I shot through the window,

and you see the light

in Virginia.

And then there's a photograph of her
down at the cabin, where she

photographed her children growing up.

And it's such a different,

introspective

They're both her.

David Hockney,

three photographs

in his bedroom.

I love there's, this

photograph of him working in his cars,
using his cars like a studio,

because I really believe the studio is

movable, is in his car, drawing

a road near his home.

And then in his bedroom, also drawing
his boyfriend at the time.

Yes, I love the series.

I do love the series, I think working.

And I love the photo story, which I
feel is,

I wish, I wish it will come back on
some level.

The show girls was such an important
series of photographs.

They became a sort of turning point in
my philosophy of portraits.

I went out to Las Vegas.

I met several show girls in their
costumes

backstage.

In between their shows.

A woman walked in, Susana macedimer,
and she came in her street clothes.

And I said can I help you?

And she said, no, no, no, I'm one of
the show girls.

I said, no, no, I couldn't believe it.

She had glasses on.

I said, you know, please let me
photograph you the way you are right

now.

I photographed her as herself.

And then she went changed and put on
her make up.

So the rest of the day is, as the women
came in, I asked if I could photograph

them as themselves before they got
ready, before they put on their

costumes and their makeup.

And it was just revelatory.

This was the first time it was

really quite clear to me, you needed
two pictures to tell this story,

and the juxtaposition of the woman in
her costume.

And then as the way she was when you
walked in,

definitely the idea that a decisive
moment that I was

trying to

emulate for so many years, or this
single photograph

sort of was thrown out the window.

I mean, I think that's an elusive

answer.

I mean, an elusive question and answer
about what makes a great photograph.

I mean, I think

taking good photographs, I mean, I think

it does come with experience.

I mean, you may take a good photograph.

You may not even know you took it it's
about, how do you

start to

understand what you're doing?

And I think that

one more time, it comes with doing it.

You have to have to do it.

Also, I think the perspective of what
the photograph means to you and why you

took it and

what

relationship you have to it,

you would have a better idea of

if the photograph

is a good photograph

for yourself.

I mean, there are photographs that I
take that I long for someone to say,

hey, that's a very nice photograph.

And to me, I love the photograph.

I'm thinking

the photograph of Agnes Martin sitting
in the paintings to you.

I love that photograph.

Because

when I asked her,

what does she do when she comes to
work, when she comes to paint?

And she said, well, I sit here and wait
to be inspired.

And then she sat down

on this bed, and you can't even see
your face.

And so

the photograph is

mired in the experience of taking that
picture.

I think

it's hard to say, what is a good
photograph is so connected with

what

feelings you have

for it.

Your picture depends on what's in it.

And it has nothing to do with

the technology.

I mean, it does.

And it doesn't

but it's

the last thing you should worry about,
you, should

you have the best,

what you think is the best equipment.

And it doesn't help if you can't see.

It takes years to understand

how to see.

I do think that

more you

take photographs and the more you

mean, I remember just being

sort of so surprised when I would see
the imagery

and what

you

got from a situation or something, that,

I mean, I literally couldn't believe it
came out, you know, I don't know, oh my

god, this is like, amazing.

So I think

it just

takes doing it over and over and over.

I,

one of the reasons

I'm still doing it, as I love to

do it.

I love to look, and it's different
every single day, and

you're photographing a different
person, it's a whole different.

Each person's different.

And

it doesn't,

I'm never tired of

going to work.

I mean, I'm going to take photographs.

I mean, it's just,

it's an adventure.

After years and years and years of
taking photographs and

taking that rectangle

that you get in your camera,

you

just instinctively know what

to sort of place,

what you're seeing

and composing

in that rectangle, it becomes an
instinctual thing, everything you do

prepares you for when you don't have
time to think about what you're doing.

And I like how the example, the serial
picture, shows you.

I mean, I was

in serjevo

doing

portraits

during the siege in 1993.

And I was on the way, I was in a car on
the way to photographing,

miss Sarajevo,

and literally right in front of me,

a mortar exploded, Bob exploded, and a
young boy

was killed, literally right in front of
the car.

And I got out

of the car and just took some
photographs.

I didn't even know what I was doing,

and we put the boy in the car and took
them to the hospital, but it was too late.

Can im quite remember taking the
picture I just did?

It's just an instinctual thing, but

it's a simple, strong graphic.

And so it's just

a kind of an idea or a lesson, that the
more you do this, the more you're ready for

anything.

So

if you look at hard copies of
newspapers,

your hometown papers, or

then

I run to the door every day and look at
the New York Times,

really from front to back.

And I occasionally

I'm asking you to do this, cut out a
photograph that you

find particularly striking or
inspirational or.

And then

take that photograph, put it to your
wall or your workspace, and then think

about it and see how,

put it away in a folder of materials to
look back on.

And then

and put it in your journal and see

how it affects how you think as you go
along