"Saint Tropez, France"

gelatin silver print

signed, titled, dated on verso

"You really don’t know what is going to happen – it starts with a woman going to a cemetery to deposit some flowers and a dog follows her." The last picture shows the dog rolling on the ground – and could stand on its own as the picture – but it is made more interesting by those that precede it. But even as the punch line, this image is still open ended. Is the dog playing dead or simply being playful?
These sequences reveal how Erwitt shoots, and he clearly has a relaxed approach and patience. "It’s like fishing. Sometimes you catch one. You lay in wait for something to happen – sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn’t," the photographer says of his process.
(Phil Bicker)¹

"It's about reacting to what you see, hopefully without preconception. You can find pictures anywhere. It's simply a matter of noticing things and organizing them. You just have to care about what's around you and have a concern with humanity and the human comedy."
Elliot Erwitt

Notes

1
Phil Bicker, "Elliott Erwitt: Sequentially Yours", Time, Lightbox, October 18, 2011, https://time.com/3781974/elliott-erwitt-sequentially-yours/ (accesed 4.12.2025)