Portrait of Imogen | movie | 1988 | Official Trailer
Photographer Imogen Cunningham presents her own work in this Academy Award-nominated documentary. | dG1fdGlxakt5amdRVVk
Category
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Short filmTranscript
00:00 [ Music ]
00:22 It made up my mind that I wanted to be a photographer. So I saved my money, whatever little it was,
00:30 and it was $15 to tell you the truth. And I sent it to the correspondence school in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
00:38 And they sent me a 4x5 camera and a box of glass plates. And I started on my own. That was 1901.
00:50 I have a formula for how to make a good photograph. I think that in order to make a good photograph,
00:59 you have to be enthusiastic. That is, you have to think about it like a poet would. And there are many choices of that.
01:07 The editor of that department in Vanity Fair at that time saw something that I did of Martha Graham.
01:16 And he wrote to me and asked me if I would be willing to go to Hollywood. And then he said, "Also, please state your preferences."
01:23 And I said, "Ugly men." Because they never complain, you know. So that's what I got. I got ugly men.
01:31 I don't hunt for anything. I don't hunt for things. I just wait until something strikes me.
01:44 You know, whenever I photograph anybody who does anything with his hands, I usually come down and focus on them and do the hand.
01:53 And today I had the most astonishing visitor, at least for me it was, because he saw my photograph of Robert Irwin's hands reading Braille in my book.
02:08 And he really bought it from that, from seeing it. He had in mind to buy it for his office. He's a surgeon of hands.
02:15 Well, I don't think there is a formula for a fine photograph for every person has a different idea about one.
02:22 I always think the finest photograph, from my way of thinking, what I do myself, is the one I'm going to do, not the one that I have done.
02:30 So as soon as I've done it, it's finished. But I'm hoping someday to do a fine one.
02:37 Think I have time?
02:39 [Music]
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