Chester Higgins
[Photographer, b. 1946, Lexington, Kentucky, lives in Brooklyn, New York.]

 I had a choice: I could wail against the racism of the [prevailing] pictures or I could go and create photographs that would tell a contrary story. 
 I learned that the camera never lies about the photographer. 
 By putting your heart into your picture making, your eye will follow. 
 I believe the spirit of things exists in everything, including plant life and animal life. So I started challenging myself to see if I could translate this spirit into an image. 
 The ancients honored the spirit in all things, a philosophy I apply to my image-making today. 
 What has always driven my photography is the search for the spirit of things.