Edward Weston Photography Quotes

To consult the rules of composition before making a picture is a little like consulting the law of gravitation before going for a walk.

Edward counseled that a photograph of consequence could be made from just about anything. Subject matter, in itself, was not critical. The understanding of the photographer was.

Group f.64 believed that photographic beauty was defined by beautiful prints produced by purely photographic means. The subjects need not be beautiful. What might appear ugly or commonplace could have value through the respectful understanding and expression of the photographer.

As to “Aesthetic Considerations,” Ansel counseled, “A photograph that is merely a superficial record of the subject fails as an aesthetic expression of that subject. The expression must be an emotional amplification, and this emotional amplification relates to point of view, organization, revelation of substance through textures, tonal relations, and the perfection of the technical expression of all these elements.”54

Weston, having been born in Chicago, was raised with typical, well-grounded, mid-western values. On his 16th birthday, his father gave him a Kodak camera with which he started what would become his lifetime vocation. During the summer of 1908, Weston met Flora May Chandler, a schoolteacher who was seven years older than he was. The following year the couple married and in time they had four sons. Weston and his family moved to Southern California and opened a portrait studio on Brand Boulevard, in the artsy section of Glendale, California, called Tropico. His artistic skills soon became apparent and he became well known for his portraits of famous people, such as Carl Sandburg and Max Eastman. In the autumn of 1913, hearing of his work, Margrethe Mather, a photographer from Los Angeles, came to his studio, where Weston asked her to be his studio assistant. It didn’t take long before the two developed a passionate, intimate relationship. Both Weston and Mather became active in the growing bohemian cultural scene in Los Angeles. She was extremely outgoing and artistic in a most flamboyant way. Her bohemian sexual values were new to Weston’s conventional thinking, but Mather excited him and presented him with a new outlook that he found enticing. Mather was beautiful, and being bisexual and having been a high-class prostitute, was delightfully worldly. Mather's uninhibited lifestyle became irresistible to Weston and her photography took him into a new and exciting art form. As Mather worked and overtly played with him, she presented a lifestyle that was in stark contrast to Weston’s conventional home life, and he soon came to see his wife Flora as a person with whom he had little in common. Weston expanded his horizons but tried to keep his affairs with other women a secret. As he immersed himself further into nude photography, it became more difficult to hide his new lifestyle from his wife. Flora became suspicious about this secret life, but apparently suffered in silence. One of the first of many women who agreed to model nude for Weston was Tina Modotti. Although Mather remained with Weston, Tina soon became his primary model and remained so for the next several years. There was an instant attraction between Tina Modotti, Mather and Edward Weston, and although he remained married, Tina became his student, model and lover. Richey soon became aware of the affair, but it didn’t seem to bother him, as they all continued to remain good friends. The relationship Tina had with Weston could definitely be considered “cheating,” since knowledge of the affair was withheld as much as possible from his wife Flora May. Perhaps his wife knew and condoned this new promiscuous relationship, since she had also endured the intense liaison with Margrethe Mather. Tina, Mather and Weston continued working together until Tina and Weston suddenly left for Mexico in 1923. As a group, they were all a part of the cozy, artsy, bohemian society of Los Angeles, which was where they were introduced to the then-fashionable, communistic philosophy.

Even their environments were opposites, and that matters. A painter can paint anywhere; the subject can spring from the painter’s mind. Photographers must be in the presence of their subjects. Stieglitz lived in and photographed a long-tamed landscape, from his skyscraper forests to the fenced pastures of his family’s summerhouse outside the city. Edward could see the snow-capped San Gabriel Mountains from his front porch, and even Los Angeles had been wilderness not that long before.

Breton, heavily influenced by Sigmund Freud, believed that art should be freed from the brake placed on creativity by the conscious mind.

Although Reed tried valiantly, the income from print sales never balanced out the high cost of framing, advertising, printing announcements, and the rent on New York’s prestigious gallery row, West Fifty-seventh Street. She confessed that the Delphic Studios were “a philanthropic endeavor rather than a business enterprise” and that, sadly, “sales were so infrequent as to make hope of any return at all from commissions a remote possibility.

Tina Modotti and EdwardWeston opened an upscale portrait studio and became involved in the avant-garde community of San Angel, a fashionable southern suburb in Mexico City, which was at one time a weekend retreat for Spanish nobility. It wasn’t until about sixty years ago that this still-quaint district became an integral part of Mexico City. Tina, as usual, modeled and romped in the nude, this time for Diego Rivera, an internationally acclaimed artist. In 1926, Diego’s wife Lupe Marín, accused him of having an affair with Tina and insisted that he not see her again. Not being daunted by his wife’s insistence, Diego frequently hung out with Tina and her younger friend Frida Kahlo, who in turn also enjoyed Diego’s company. It was all just part of the wild times in San Angel, however it probably led to Diego and Lupe’s separation and ultimate divorce.

The important and only vital question is, how much greater, finer, am I than I was yesterday? Have I fulfilled my possibilities, made the most of my potentialities. What a marvelous world if all would, could hold this attitude toward life.34