A Quote by Amy Arbus

Richard Avedon taught me that if you go into a photo session and come out with what you had hoped for, it’s a failure. You need to be surprised if you want it to be magical.
I think I hoped for something more. Maybe I even hoped that I could find in Richard what I had with Ben. But it is suddenly very clear: Richard is not fallin in love with me and I'm not falling in love with Richard. We are not creating anything permanent or special. We are only having fun together. It is a fling- a fling just like he said last night- a fling with an ending yet to be determined. I feel relieved to have it defined
By that point, I had started taking singing lessons. And after the first session, I mean, I was surprised that the windows didn't shatter. And after the third session, I really didn't know where this voice had come from.
I felt like I was in the best photography school in the world - I had Herb Ritts, Bruce Weber, Richard Avedon and Irving Penn teach me.
I think about a Richard Avedon photo series, the kind of faces he gets of real people, which I find so captivating. Fellini was also great in filling his films with this ambiance, this environment, sometimes chaotic and carnival-like, but people's faces were always amazing.
American 'Vogue' and the Versace campaign by Richard Avedon were huge for me. It put me on the map.
SNL' pushed my limits. It was great. It taught me about fame, it taught me about the business; it was definitely the best experience, or one of the best, that I've had so far. It was a primer for what was to come and what I want out of life.
Some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously, that you might as well not have lived at all. In which case you have failed by default. Failure gave me an inner security that I had never obtained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things that I could not have learned any other way. I discovered I had a strong will and more discipline than I had suspected.
Richard Avedon is a true genius of photography and one of the greatest artists of our time.
You'd be surprised how many times I've had to have that conversation with heads of state who want to say to me, 'Well, look, I know you can have some influence on the president. I need you to go back and tell him this.'
You never know when you're gonna come across a sick skate spot, or a skate park you wanna stop at, so as long as I'm not injured, I'm always gonna have my board on me, and my skate shoes, and whatever I need to go out there and get a little session in.
I was taught that to create anything you had to believe in failure, simply because you had to be prepared to go through an idea without any fear. Failure, you learned, as I did in art school, to be a wonderful thing. It allowed you to get up in the morning and take the pillow off your head.
I am not surprised that this is a longer bit of work than many of us would have hoped. It is not where any of us would have hoped it is. And I think we need to give credit to the Republicans in Congress who have done everything they can to defeat every jobs bill and slow down the economy.
Prison was a blessing. Going to prison was the greatest thing that happened to me. It showed me that I wasn't infallible. It showed me that I was just human. It showed me that I can be back with my ghetto brothers I grew up with and have a good time. It taught me to cool out. It taught me patience. It taught me that I didn't ever want to lose my freedom. It taught me that drugs bring on the devil. It taught me to grow up.
I remember this time I worked with Linda Evangelista on a shoot for Richard Avedon. I just put grease on her face, and it was beautiful.
I moved to leave, and Dylan actually grabbed my shoulders. I was so surprised that i forgot to karate-chop his elbows and break his arms.' “I don’t want anything to happen to you,” he said urgently. “What you want does not matter here,” I said slowly and carefully. I hoped Dylan was sensitive enough to read between the lines, to the subtext of: Let go of me or I’ll kill you.
I came out as a gay as I have earned myself respect as an athlete. I have only lost 2 out of 22 professional fights. I knocked out some of my opponents in the first round. But I never really received respect as a person. That's something I had come to realize over the past few years. The end of my boxing career is no longer that far off, and it was time for me to make peace with myself. And there was a second reason for me to come out: I hoped it would make me a better boxer.
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