A Quote by Alec Soth

I've never been comfortable photographing people I know, myself included. I guess I prefer the mystery of strangers. — © Alec Soth
I've never been comfortable photographing people I know, myself included. I guess I prefer the mystery of strangers.
...I started photographing myself, and found that I could see portions of myself that I had never seen before. Since I face just my face in the mirror, I know pretty much what it's like. When I see a side-view I'm not used to it, and find it peculiar... So, photographing myself and discovering unknown territories of my surface self causes an interesting psychological confrontation.
I realized I was trained my whole life to be an accommodating person, to make sure that everybody is comfortable before I'm comfortable. After giving so much of myself to strangers, I learned to care for myself a little more, especially on tour.
I don't really see myself that way, as some typical sexy young ingénue. I've never been that way. And, for a while, there was a disconnect between who I am and how I present myself on a public platform. That was because I didn't necessarily feel comfortable sharing that much of myself with other people who I didn't know.
People aren’t photographing for history any more. It’s for immediate gratification. If you’re photographing to share an image, you’re not photographing to keep it.
I am writing for myself and strangers. This is the only way that I can do it. Everybody is a real one to me, everybody is like some one else too to me. No one of them that I know can want to know it and so I write for myself and strangers.
I guess I'd rather be comfortable and play well because I'm comfortable than to get recognition and play someplace where I wouldn't be comfortable and wouldn't enjoy myself.
I am also atheist or agnostic (I don't even know the difference). I've never been to church and prefer to think for myself.
It's never been bad or ridiculous. I know who I am and what I've done, and I'm really comfortable with myself.
I can see myself as a very old man in a terrific wheelchair. Only, I won't be photographing the tree outside my window, the way Steichen did. I'll be photographing other old people.
I see myself as a character actor, and I've always been drawn to playing characters that are different from myself because acting is escapism for me. I've never been that comfortable playing people that are like me.
I just constantly tell myself that I should be the only one to define my worth and what I'm capable of and how I perceive myself. And that I should never source that worth from other people, especially strangers on social media. They don't know who I am, the length of my journey, who I am as a person.
I always considered myself being an organizer. I'm very good at teaching singers, I'm very good at staging a show, to entertain people. But I never included myself. I never applied this to me as an artist.
I never stopped photographing. There were a couple of years when I didn't have a darkroom, but that didn't stop me from photographing.
There could have never been two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison, no countenances so beloved. Now they were as strangers; nay, worse than strangers, for they could never become acquainted. It was a perpetual estrangement.
I sort of set myself really high standards which is good and bad. If I know that I've done all I can to prepare, that's when I race the best and in '09 I was going through a lot of emotional ups and downs and I was never as fit as I would have liked to have been. So I never felt comfortable.
It's never been about trying to look well-behaved. It's just how I am. I guess it's a weird thing to be 19 and not ever have been drunk, but for me, it just feels normal because I don't really know any other way. I don't know if I'd be comfortable getting wasted and not knowing what I've said. That doesn't mean when I'm older I won't have a glass of wine. I just don't think it's such a strange thing for me not to be wasted all the time.
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