Maestros de la fotografía: Joseph Koudelka extracto de entrevista de Frank Horvat

Born in Biskovice (Czechoslovakia), January 10, 1938.
Studies aeronautical engineering.
1961: first voyage abroad (Italy).
Meets Anna Farova, who introduces him to the history of photography.
1961-1967: photographs the gypsies of Czechoslovakia and makes theater
photographs while earning a living as an aeronautical engineer.
1967: decides to devote himself exclusively to photography.
1968: reportage on the occupation of Prague by the Soviet army.
1970: leaves Czechoslovakia.
1971: member of Magnum.
Lives in Paris.


"I do not try to understand. For me, the most beautiful thing is to wake up, to go out, and to look. At everything. Without anyone telling me "You should look at this or that." I look at everything and I try to find what interests me, because when I set out, I don't yet know what will interest me. I try to react to what comes up. Afterwards, I may come back to it, perhaps every year, ten years in a row, and I will end by understanding."



"I have had the good fortune of always being able to do what I wanted, never working for others. Maybe it is a silly principle, but the idea that no one can buy me is important for me. I refuse assignments, even for projects that I have decided to do anyhow. It is somewhat the same with my books. When my first book, the one on the gypsies, was published, it was hard for me to accept the idea that I could no longer choose the people to whom I would show my photos, that any one could buy them."



"Questions about the world are difficult for me. I mistrust words. I come from a system where words have no value. I got used to not listening much to what people say. Or rather, I listen to them, but I give less importance to what they say, than to the way in which they say it. When someone declares: "I am a communist", (or a socialist, or an anarchist), that means nothing to me. What counts is what people do."