I must say that I love LensWork magazine. Despite its small size it truly stands out among other photography magazines. Because LensWork is not about technical aspects of photography which are not significant in my view, it is about Photography and the Creative Process. Every time I read LensWork I find quotes about what I think is truly important for me in photography. I have a collection of these quotes now. I decided to put them on my website and wrote this email to Brooks Jensen, LensWork Editor:

Dear Brooks,

I’m a great fan of your magazine. I think LensWork is the only genuine photography magazine on the market right now. I read it from cover to cover. I have been your fateful subscriber for many years (including your new Extended Edition). I have all your books (in both editions) and I think I bought every single item from your online store. My wish for you: just keep going. You are setting higher standards for the rest of us.

The reason I’m bothering you is not just worship, glorification and adoration to you and your magazine. I have a favor to ask. I’m redesigning my website and I want to use some quotes from LensWork publications and interviews. I guess there is a copyright issue. I officially ask your permission to use these quotes on my website. I will always have a reference to the author, article title and LensWork issue number. It will look something like that:

——————————————————-

“Photographers often pretend that they work in a media that is purely visual and independent of the influence of text and words, but in fact, it is a great delusion.”

Brooks Jensen
Image and Text
LensWork, Number 15

——————————————————-

I will gratefully appreciate your positive response to my request. In exchange I will promote LensWork from my website as best as I can. I will do that anyway regardless of your decision.

Sincerely,
Igor Menaker
www.menaker.com

Well, a few days later I’ve got email from Brooks:

Igor,
Thanks for all your interest in LensWork!

Feel free to use quotes as you need to with the attribution per your example. If you have room and it doesn’t mess up your layout, a link back to www.lenswork.com would be appreciated.

Thanks!
Brooks Jensen
Editor, LensWork Publishing

Written Thursday June 01, 2006 at 1:25PM

This entry was posted on Friday, June 2nd, 2006 at 7:38 am and is filed under Quote of the Day. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.