What a wonderful time spent as a professional photographer and educator, it was inevitable to have a collection of these quotable quotes.

Some of us with the passing of time habitually collect a diverse selection of quotes; these move us with a slight sensitivity one way or the other. We might have contributed to this collection with a mental note, jotting it down or snipped it out of some reading material, with a purpose to reuse when the moment ripe for its application. Here I share some of my favorites related to the art of photography. Plus there are live links to various photographers' sites, leading to most of these famous names mentioned here.

I wish more people felt that photography was an adventure the same as life itself and felt that their individual feelings were worth expressing. To me, that makes photography more exciting.”
~  Harry Callahan

No matter how slow the film, the spirit always stands still long enough for the photographer it has chosen. ~ Minor White ::. http://www.masters-of-photography.com/W/white/white_devils_slide_full.html

It takes a lot of imagination to be a good photographer. You need less imagination to be a painter because you can invent things. But in photography everything is so ordinary; it takes a lot of looking before you learn to see the extraordinary. ~ David Bailey

To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event. ~ Henri Cartier Bresson ::. http://www.porto.art.br/bresson/

The camera can photograph thought. It's better than a paragraph of sweet polemic. ~ Dirk Bogarde

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.
~ Robert Doisneau ::. http://www.staleywise.com/collection/doisneau/doisneau.html

The magic of photography is metaphysical. What you see in the photograph isn't what you saw at the time. The real skill of photography is organized visual lying. ~ Terence Donovan

Photography records the gamut of feelings written on the human face, the beauty of the earth and skies that man has inherited, and the wealth and confusion man has created. It is a major force in explaining man to man. ~ Edward Steichen ::. http://www.staleywise.com/collection/steichen/steichen.html

Some people are still unaware that reality contains unparalleled beauties. The fantastic and unexpected, the ever-changing and renewing is nowhere so exemplified as in real life itself.
~ Berenice Abbott ::. http://www.artsmia.org/get-the-picture/abbott/

A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed. ~ Ansel Adams ::. http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/adams.html

A picture is the expression of an impression. If the beautiful were not in us, how would we ever recognize it? ~ Ernst Haas

I almost never set out to photograph a landscape, nor do I think of my camera as a means of recording a mountain or an animal unless I absolutely need a 'record shot'. My first thought is always of light.
~ Galen Rowell ::. http://www.mountainlight.com

[Photography] is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever... it remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything. ~ Aaron Siskind ::. http://www.aaronsiskind.org/images.html

There is nothing worse than a sharp image of a fuzzy concept. ~ Ansel Adams ::. http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/adams.html

I think you have to have a real point of view that's your own. You have to tell it your way. And, I think that it's a mistake to shoot for a specific magazine's point of view because it's never going to be as good. You have to shoot for yourself and photograph [the way] you believe it. ~ Mary Ellen Mark ::. http://www.maryellenmark.com/

Above all, it's hard learning to live with vivid mental images of scenes I cared for and failed to photograph. It is the edgy existence within me of these unmade images that is the only assurance that the best photographs are yet to be made. ~ Sam Abel ::. http://www.mastersofphotography.com/Directory/sabell/

...words and pictures can work together to communicate more powerfully than either alone. ~ William Albert Allard ::. http://www.temple.edu/photo/photographers/allard/allard2.htm

Simply look with perceptive eyes at the world about you, and trust to your own reactions and convictions. Ask yourself: "Does this subject move me to feel, think and dream? Can I visualize a print - my own personal statement of what I feel and want to convey - from the subject before me?" ~ Ansel Adams ::. http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/adams.html

Now to consult the rules of composition before making a picture is a little like consulting the law of gravitation before going for a walk. Such rules and laws are deduced from the accomplished fact; they are the products of reflection . ~ Edward Weston ::. http://www.boston.com/mfa/weston/

Sometimes you can tell a large story with a tiny subject. ~ Eliot Porter ::. http://www.afterimagegallery.com/porterinwildness.htm [b&w images]  
::. http://www.masters-of-photography.com/P/porter/porter_roadrunner_full.html [color images]

It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to.... The feeling for the things themselves, for reality, is more important than the feeling for pictures.
~ Vincent Van Gogh

The virtue of the camera is not the power it has to transform the photographer into an artist, but the impulse it gives him to keep on looking. ~ Brooks Anderson

You can find pictures anywhere. It's simply a matter of noticing things and organizing them. You just have to care about what's around you and have a concern with humanity and the human comedy
~ Elliott Erwitt ::. http://www.magnumphotos.com/Erwitt.html

Memory is very important, the memory of each photo taken, flowing at the same speed as the event. During the work, you have to be sure that you haven't left any holes, that you've captured everything, because afterwards it will be too late. ~ Henri Cartier Bresson

No place is boring, if you've had a good night's sleep and have a pocket full of unexposed film. ~ Robert Adams ::. http://www.masters-of-photography.com/A/adamsr/adamsr_newworld4_full.html

It is light that reveals, light that obscures, light that communicates. It is light I "listen" to. The light late in the day has a distinct quality, as it fades toward the darkness of evening. After sunset there is a gentle leaving of the light, the air begins to still, and a quiet descends. I see magic in the quiet light of dusk. I feel quiet, yet intense energy in the natural elements of our habitat. A sense of magic prevails, a sense of mystery. It is a time for contemplation, for listening - a time for making photographs. ~ John Sexton

Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still. ~ Dorothea Lange ::. http://www.masters-of-photography.com/L/lange/lange_bread_line_full.html

Once photography enters your bloodstream, it's like a disease. ~ Anon

Photography, as a powerful medium of expression and communications, offers an infinite variety of perception, interpretation and execution. ~ Ansel Adams

People are under the illusion that it's easy...Technically, it is complex. You have a million options with equipment to distract you. I tell me students to simplify their equipment. ~ Brett Weston

Pick a theme and work it to exhaustion...the subject must be something you truly love or truly hate.
~ Dorothea Lange ::. http://www.masters-of-photography.com/L/lange/lange_bread_line_full.html

Photography for me is not looking, it's feeling. If you can't feel what you're looking at, then you're never going to get others to feel anything when they look at your pictures. ~ Don McCullin

Above all, I craved to seize the whole essence, in the confines of one single photograph, of some situation that was in the process of unrolling itself before my eyes. ~ Henri Cartier Bresson

Of course, there will always be those who look only at techniques, who ask "how," while others of a more curious nature will ask "why." Personally, I have always preferred inspiration to information. ~ Man Ray

The artist's world is limitless. It can be found anywhere, far from where he lives or a few feet away. It is always on his doorstep.
~ Paul Strand ::. http://www.masters-of-photography.com/S/strand/strand_wall_street_full.html

To take photographs is to hold one's breath when all faculties converge in the face of fleeing reality. It is at that moment that mastering an image becomes a great physical and intellectual joy.
~ Henri Cartier Bresson ::. http://www.photo-seminars.com/Fame/bresson.htm

The ear tends to be lazy, craves the familiar and is shocked by the unexpected; the eye, on the other hand, tends to be impatient, craves the novel and is bored by repetition. ~ W. H. Auden

The two most engaging powers of [a photographer] are to make new things familiar and familiar things new. ~ W. Thackeray

I shutter to think how many people are underexposed and lacking depth in this field. ~ Rick Steves

To photograph truthfully and effectively is to see beneath the surfaces and record the qualities of nature and humanity which live or are latent in all things. ~ Ansel Adams

Sometimes I do get to places just when God's ready to have somebody click the shutter. ~ Ansel Adams ::. http://www.zpub.com/sf/history/adams.html

If your pictures aren't good enough, you're not close enough. ~ Robert Capa ::. http://www.photo-seminars.com/Fame/capa.htm

I wish more people felt that photography was an adventure the same as life itself and felt that their individual feelings were worth expressing. To me, that makes photography more exciting.
~ Harry Callahan ::. http://www.masters-of-photography.com/C/callahan/callahan_detroit_full.html