Annie Leibovitz
[Photographer, b. 1949, Westbury, Connecticut, lives in New York.]
In this day and age of things moving so, so fast, we still long for things to stop, and we as a society love the still image.
(2013) 
I don’t mind doing something obvious. I’m not looking for the ultimate image, the ultimate essence of someone. The chances of that happening are far and few between.
My early childhood equipped me really well for my portrait work: The quick encounter, where you are not going to know the subject for very long. These days I am much more comfortable with the fifteen minute relationship, than I am with a life long relationship.
I no longer believe that there is such a thing as objectivity. Everyone has a point of view. Some people call it style, but what we’re really talking about here is the guts of a photograph. When you trust your point of view, that’s when you start taking pictures.
There’s just so much to keep learning. You think you know something, and you realize you haven’t really been looking that close yet.
Very much like everyone else, I’m using what’s out there now and learning how to use it. Like everyone else, I sometimes go too far... There’s a little too much [digital] hanky panky with this stuff and I want to try to bring it back.
(2014)
It’s like sitting in a room with ghosts. You go through your pictures and you think about what that shoot was like, who that person was, what that meant, that time in your own life.
When I say I want to photograph someone, what it really means is that I’d like to know them. Anyone I know I photograph.
