William Klein Quotes

I like film. I'm old fashioned.
I like the streets. I grew up in the streets.
I saw New York differently after being in Paris for a few years.
I think it's obscene. I don't know how you support the monarchy. How can you do that?
I think that Damien Hirst putting a shark in a bath of formaldehyde is nothing.
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.
I thought it would be good not to hide the fact that you're taking a photograph, and have people react and come in close and also make a commentary on what's being photographed: 'This is a photo, this is my point of view.'
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.
I was a very clumsy Jewish kid.
I was fascinated by the Black Panthers because I'd been in contact with the Nation of Islam, thanks to Muhammad Ali, and their way of talking was that the whites were the devil, and they'd get rid of them once they took over.
I was making a film on Muhammad Ali in 1964, and I went to Miami to film everything around the fight for the world championship with Sonny Liston. I had the good luck of flying down to Miami, and there was one empty seat, and the guy sitting next to this empty seat was Malcolm X.
I wasn't part of any movement. I was working alone, following my instinct.
I'm an outsider, I guess.
I'm known for fashion photographs, but fashion photographs were mostly a joke for me. In 'Vogue,' girls were playing at being duchesses, but they were actually from Flatbush, Brooklyn. They would play duchesses, and I would play Cecil Beaton.
If a film is a real knockout like 'Raging Bull,' it does not matter that it might not have happened like that.
If I didn't have to earn a living somehow, I would never have taken a fashion photograph in my life.
If I look back, I think most of the things I did - the films, the books, the collaborations with these magazines - were mostly by accident.
In America, kids would go to college and get out and buy a second-hand car and go across the country and discover America. I never did that; I went from New York to Paris, and New York was my America.
In fashion, you have assistants, flashes; you can make sets. There are people running around doing things for you. But I can take it or leave it.
In the late Fifties and early Sixties, I used to think that most of these fashion creators weren't that great, and if the photograph was good, it was mostly thanks to the photographer.
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AuthorName
William Klein
Profession
Photographer
BirthDate
19 April, 1928
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