A biography for William Kleinhasn’t been written yet.
“My complaint is that Americans drive me crazy, and the politics drive me crazy.”
“When I was a kid in New York, long before saturation sports coverage, the world heavyweight championship was, with the baseball World Series, the great national event.”
“I saw New York differently after being in Paris for a few years.”
“People didn't object to me taking their photo. It was something everybody thought was their due: to be King for a Day, win the lottery and be photographed.”
“I always dreamt of becoming an artist in Paris. Thanks to the Army, it happened.”
“My sister was brilliant: she was in the 25 top math students in the country. When she finished college, I said, 'Spend a couple of months here in Europe. You'll get another take on life.' She never came - married some schmuck who made clothes for fat women on Seventh Avenue.”
“In fashion, you have assistants, flashes; you can make sets. There are people running around doing things for you. But I can take it or leave it.”
“Fashion was more of a sideline for me. I did it for the money.”
“In America, kids would go to college and get out and buy a second-hand car and go across the country and discover America. I never did that; I went from New York to Paris, and New York was my America.”
“In the late Fifties and early Sixties, I used to think that most of these fashion creators weren't that great, and if the photograph was good, it was mostly thanks to the photographer.”
“I always dreamed of working in Paris, of going to the Coupole and slapping Picasso or Giacometti on the shoulder.”
“You do things for yourself, and you do things for other people, and you hope that these things coincide.”
“My father was like Willy Loman, you know: he never really made it - and he was from a family where there were people who had made it.”
“I was a very clumsy Jewish kid.”
“I had an experience that was kind of backward. Instead of thinking that photography was a step down, it brought me a step up, to transpose and modify things.”
“Memories. That's the thing about photography. I look at the contact sheet, and it brings back everything: whether I was tired, whether I was full of beans.”
“For my first book, 'New York,' I had one camera and two lenses. It was fotografia povera.”
“Fashion had no interest for me. I would take photographs in the studio. I would go back home, and my wife would say, 'What is the fashion like for this season?' And I would say, 'I have no idea.'”
“I grew up in New York, in a rough neighborhood where our biggest concern was not getting beat up. I was always far from the center of the Big Apple.”
“Photography led me to experiment in graphic work and, actually, painting.”