Martin Parr

I avoid Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, and if I need to communicate with someone, I email direct.

— Martin Parr

Photography is the simplest thing in the world, but it is incredibly complicated to make it really work.

— Martin Parr

We live in a difficult but inspiring world, and there is so much out there that I want to record.

— Martin Parr

With photography, I like to create a fiction out of reality. I try and do this by taking society's natural prejudice and…

— Martin Parr

Sometimes you feel uncomfortable taking a photograph, but that's all part of the job.

— Martin Parr

Unless it hurts, unless there’s some vulnerability there, I don’t think you’re going to get good photographs.

— Martin Parr

I am kept awake by the list of possibilities for shooting more photos and deciding what I must prioritise next.

— Martin Parr

I get up early and open my emails, write cheques, and answer the phone; whatever needs to be done.

— Martin Parr

If you go to the supermarket and buy a package of food and look at the photo on the front, the food…

— Martin Parr

In the '70s, in Britain, if you were going to do serious photography, you were obliged to work in black-and-white. Color was…

— Martin Parr

We are drowning in images. Photography is used as a propaganda tool, which serves to sell products and ideas. I use the…

— Martin Parr

You can read a lot about a country by looking at its beaches: across cultures, the beach is that rare public space…

— Martin Parr

One of the things I regret is that magazines now are so lifestyle-orientated that the opportunity to do bigger projects is gone.…

— Martin Parr

Part of the role of photography is to exaggerate. Most of the photographs in your paper, unless they are hard news, are…

— Martin Parr

When I visited Vietnam for Oxfam, the thing that really struck me was how the local farmers had to prepare to evacuate…

— Martin Parr

Photos tend to organize chaos, to define what we're doing here. It is essential that individuals' voices depict the world around us,…

— Martin Parr

The knack is to find your own inspiration and take it on a journey to create work that is personal and revealing.

— Martin Parr

Of course, New Brighton is very shabby, very rundown, but people still go there because it's the place where you take kids…

— Martin Parr

Photography's central role is to be the absolute medium of the day. It is fantastic that there is no longer any technical…

— Martin Parr

Margaret Thatcher was very good for the arts in so far as it gave people a real focus for something to be…

— Martin Parr

For those aspiring to make a living from travel photography, it's a sad fact that the boring shots are the shots that…

— Martin Parr

Criticism is hypocrisy; society is hypocrisy. I'm a tourist. I'm a consumer. I do the things that I photograph and can be…

— Martin Parr

From the moment the tourist enters the site, everyone has to be photographed in front of every feature of note… The photographic…

— Martin Parr

Modern technology has taken the angst out of achieving the perfect shot. For me, the only thing that counts is the idea…

— Martin Parr

Sepia in particular tends to make everything look a bit romantic and almost sentimental, hence the fact that it remains such a…

— Martin Parr

Personally, I don't take holidays; I go on trips. My idea of relaxing is taking a trip that isn't commissioned. I'll work…

— Martin Parr

Over the years, I have perfected the art of dancing and photographing at the same time: it's a great double act. If…

— Martin Parr