Some moments are gone before you realise you should have held on to them.
For me, the camera is a key. It allows me to step into other people’s lives – and sometimes, as trust grows, they show me something they rarely reveal. For me, capturing that moment is the very heart of photography.
A portrait isn’t created by pressing the shutter button. It’s created beforehand – in what happens between two people before the picture is taken. I listen. I ask questions. I wait. And eventually, the person I’m with forgets that there’s a camera there.
That is exactly when a photograph becomes a portrait.
This quest for the authentic moment takes me everywhere – to the edge of the lawn, into encounters with people I haven’t met before. Always on the lookout for that unique perspective from which something amazing can be discovered.
The closer you get to a person, the greater the responsibility becomes. That is why, for me, the most important thing remains the dignity of the person in front of the lens. That sounds obvious. But it isn’t.
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Photo copyright © Tanja Krämer.