96 Quotes by Sam Abell

Editorial photography has to be energetic and visually competitive.

My parents, grandmother and brother were teachers. My mother taught Latin and French and was the school librarian. My father taught geography and a popular class called Family Living, the precursor to Sociology, which he eventually taught. My grandmother was a beloved one-room school teacher at Knob School, near Sonora in Larue County, Ky.

Photography, alone of the arts, seems perfected to serve the desire humans have for a moment - this very moment - to stay.

It matters little how much equipment we use; it matters much that we be masters of all we do use.

For sheer majestic geography and sublime scale, nothing beats Alaska and the Yukon. For culture, Japan. And for all-around affection, Australia.

My father taught me photography. It was his hobby, and we had a small darkroom in the fruit cellar of our basement. It was the kind of makeshift darkroom that was only dark at night.

My best work is often almost unconscious and occurs ahead of my ability to understand it.

When I first went to 'National Geographic,' I thought I was the least qualified person to step through the doors. But because of my parents and the culture of continual learning they imposed on us, I later came to believe I was the most qualified person who ever worked there.

I was known as a 35-mm photographer with a view-camera mentality.