P.H. Emerson was one of photography's earliest champions as an independent art form. He believed photography should not imitate painting, but rather express the world as we experience it through our own eyes.
A man of both science and art, Emerson embraced natural light, selective focus, and the honest observation of everyday life. Yet, remarkably, just a year after publishing his influential manifesto Naturalistic Photography in 1889, he publicly questioned his own theories and photography's place among the fine arts.
I have always admired artists who are willing to challenge their own convictions. Emerson reminds us that art is as much about questioning what we know as it is about what we see.