All Quotes

My grandfather and his wife came to America at the end of the 19th century from Hungary. Everyone started out on the Lower East Side. They became embourgeoise and would move to the Upper West Side. Then, if they'd make money, they'd move to Park Avenue. Their kids would become artists and move down to the Lower East Side and the Village. ”

My father was convinced that America was the greatest place in the world. I'm afraid I didn't have the family I would have dreamed of. ”

I didn't really know who Cassius Clay was. I just wanted to show America through a heavyweight championship fight. Ever since my childhood, I'd been fascinated by the way the whole country becomes polarised around this event. ”

My father was like Willy Loman, you know: he never really made it - and he was from a family where there were people who had made it. ”

I did a film on Muhammad Ali before he was champion. I was there when he became champion in 1964. I was happy to be able to document the development of a real American hero. ”

I was 24 years old at the time. I had no real notion of what photography was about. I had no training. By accident, I put a negative in an enlarger, and you can do many things with that negative. ”

The digital camera takes photographs in practically no light: it will dig out the least bit of light available. I was amazed to see the results of photographs that I wouldn't take ordinarily. That's the advantage of digital photography. ”

When you use film, you use accidents, but there aren't any accidents with digital photography. I don't mind that it's easy. But I do mind that there is a sort of consensus with the camera and the subject and the light, and you look at something, and you photograph it, and you get what you see. ”

I thought it would be a good idea to look at New York with this half-European, half-native eye and really do something to get back at this city that I thought really gave me a hard time when I grew up. ”

Photography led me to experiment in graphic work and, actually, painting. ”