14 Quotes by Harold Feinstein

Coney Island was the centre of the world for me. I loved the rides, the hot dogs - I've never gotten over it.

I always feel I had a very lucky life. For example, I sure didn't want to go in the army: when I was drafted in the Korean War, I wanted to go as a photographer. But luckily, they put me in the infantry - luckily because the official photographer was photographing the medal awarding and all the official situations.

Coney Island is and always will be 'the people's playground.' It's a place where people of all backgrounds come to have a good time.

I was born in Coney Island. I like to think I fell out of the womb onto the fun park's giant Parachute Jump while eating a Nathan's hot dog.

Mostly, I worked so quickly, I didn't see the details of a photograph until it was printed.

The thing is that pictures are everywhere. The question is what we don't see, and why don't we see so much. I just see it.

I began photographing in 1946. Before that, I was a painter and drawer, with my mother and father's support. They were a bit pissed when I went into photography. They thought photographers were guys who took pictures at weddings.

I love this life. I feel like I am always catching my breath and saying, 'Oh! Will you look at that?' Photography has been my way of bearing witness to the joy I find in seeing the extraordinary in ordinary life. You don't look for pictures. Your pictures are looking for you.

I was drawn to street photography because there are pictures everywhere there: a woman holding a dog, a baby screaming to be put in a pram, kids playing punch ball, stores with huge barrels of kosher pickles outside. I wanted to photograph life, and here it was.