“The story is told of Michelangelo being asked about his methods for sculpting.He replied simply that he worked on a block of marble, removing all that was notpart of the sculpture until only the sculpture remained. I suspect this oversimplifiesthe art of sculpture, but it’s an excellent analogy for photography, which isessentially an art of exclusion.”

“[Robert Rauschenberg, 1925-2008] helped to obscure the lines between painting and sculpture, painting and photography, photography and printmaking, sculpture and photography, sculpture and dance, sculpture and technology, technology and performance art — not to mention between art and life.”

“What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul.”

“Anyone can take a picture of poverty; it’s easy to focus on the dirt and hurt of the poor. It’s much harder—and much more needful—to pry under that dirt and reveal the beauty and dignity of people that, but for their birth into a place and circumstance different from our own, are just like ourselves. I want my images to tell the story of those people and to move us beyond pity to justice and mercy.”

“Take a moment. What was it you saw when you were moved to pick up the camera? I'm going to pretend I didn't hear you mutter something about thinking "it looked cool." Dig deeper. Was it a thought, a feeling, a simple moment when your eyes did a double-take at the intersection of two lines? Was it a lick of light, two blocks of color?”

“It’s the difference between your wife’s passport photograph and the portraits you took when you gotengaged. Both may have been created with similar technology, but what stands in that great gulf between them are the passion you have for your wife, the knowledge you have of her personality, and your willingness to use your craft, time, and energy to express that. One says, “She looks like this.” The other says, “This is who she is to me. It’s how I feel about her. See how amazing she is?”

“The arts which need interpretation are the arts of time -- music and poetry -- and not the arts of space -- sculpture and painting.”