The man at Kodak told me the shots were very good and if I kept it up, they would give me an exhibition. Later, Kodak gave me my first exhibition.
I think maybe the rural influence in my life helped me in a sense, of knowing how to get close to people and talk to them and get my work done.
I suffered evils, but without allowing them to rob me of the freedom to expand.
So I went to Chicago in 1940, I think, '41, and the photographs that I made there, aside from fashion, were things that I was trying to express in a social conscious way.
The subject matter is so much more important than the photographer.
I'd become sort of involved in things that were happening to people. No matter what color they be, whether they be Indians, or Negroes, the poor white person or anyone who was I thought more or less getting a bad shake.
