Interview Magazine currently has an interesting exchange between William Eggleston & Harmony Korine on their website. Although Korine addresses the same territory as every other interviewer (Eggleston's landmark use of color, his relationship with Szarkowski and MOMA, his interest in the American vernacular landscape, etc.) there are some engaging insights. Below is an excerpt of the interview.
HK: Are there any particular images that you've never been able to get out of your head?
WE: Not that I can think of. I've also never had favorite pictures. Or subjects. I have this discipline of treating everything equally-I used to say "democratically."
HK: You kind of edit as you go. In some ways you work opposite of how a lot of photographers work today.
WE: Exactly. They take too many pictures.
HK: Well, it's playing the odds, right? If you take a thousand photos-
WE: It doesn't mean that one is going to be good. That's the problem.
HK: You can take a thousand photos and they could all be terrible.
WE: Generally, that's what happens-a fundamental rotting of the idea. They woke up with the wrong idea. It's just like music: If you don't have an innate love or calling for it, then no matter how much you study or how well you can play by looking at the score, it doesn't mean that you're going to make really good music.
Image © William Eggleston
