I've never really understood tattoos. I mean, it's your body - why would you wanna scar it? I don't mind other people's tattoos, but I just never got it.
— Juergen Teller
In order to do something really good, you have to take risks - that's what I do.
I like the luxurious, dressing-up aspect of fashion.
I'm interested in extrovert characters, people who are doing something. But I used to only be able to photograph people I was interested in or attracted to, either psychologically or physically. That all changed when I did the 'Go Sees.'
In Germany, the body is treated rather differently than in the U.K. or U.S. I grew up with a swimming pool in our garden and a sauna in our basement.
I like Ryan McGinley's work.
I like physical exercise. I cycle, run, and play tennis and football with my son.
I don't care what other people think. I hate conforming, that you have to wear this to a business meeting or that to a dinner. I've never worked that way.
For my 50th birthday, my cousin Helmut gave me the most profound, beautiful, and striking present. He made books out of my dad's slide photographs, which were stored and forgotten. Looking at those books made me cry.
In Bavaria, many homes have a cosy room which is all wood and is filled with special things. My grandfather had such a room, and he made the panels on the walls himself; each one told a story.
I had no visual imagination as a child. I liked playing football. That was it.
It's important to spend time with your work. That's when you see it, when you have a feeling.
I want adventure in my life. I want to do things I haven't done before. These Hollywood people are so careful of their image and looking right, but there's a wildness when I come into the photographs. I just want to wade through rivers, climb mountains.
Family is a major part of my life.
I'm not interested in running around from one shoot to another.
You can't get away from fashion. The whole beauty thing is everywhere. It's just really weird.
When you're a kid, what you learn in school about being German has a sort of heaviness about it, and you have a sort of guilt with you.
It's important to be involved in different things for me.
I don't try to be original; I just always want to do something that excites me.
Quite frankly, if I didn't enjoy the fashion industry, then I wouldn't continue to do it.
I like the idea that things can exist in different formats - in a gallery, a fashion ad, in books.
My father and one of my grandfathers died very early, and female figures have been an influential part of my life.
I would be lost without my family.
I cycle whenever possible around London. But I travel first class when I need to fly.
I don't understand longer shorts. I don't think they look good on anyone.
I like people with conviction, who are in control of themselves. I'm not interested in working with a designer who hires a creative director.
When you have your own kid, it suddenly makes you more aware of how your parents treated you and educated you. Your relationships with your partner, your uncles, your mother all change; you're more conscious of where you came from, of where your roots are. I find that very interesting.
I see through my eyes; the camera is just a machine to record it for me.
I take it very seriously, the photographic craft.
I never really think of anyone as models, even the models.
I go, wherever there is my interest, where my heart and feeling take me.
I like friendship.
I don't care about fashion at all.
If I do a portrait, I know what they can take. If somebody's a sweet, shy person, the photographs will be sweet and shy. Of course, you ask people to do something which they might not have done before, but that's the journey, the fun element.
I have a way of opening up people and gaining their trust. I think they can see my vulnerability because I'm unafraid to admit if something doesn't quite work.
I find it quite fascinating to see how the body works.
Everything I choose to photograph, I think is beautiful.
When I came to London in 1986, I was amazed at how prudish everyone was.
I always work with two cameras. Its kind of like I'm hypnotizing the subject with the flashing. It's a bombardment of action, flashes, and I think it helps them to ease into the process.
It was really inspiring to be in West London in the late 1980s and early 1990s, especially in Mark Lebon's Crunch Studios, where I met people like Ray Petri, Neneh Cherry, Judy Blame, Nick and Barry Kamen, Zoe Bedeaux, and Venetia Scott.
A few brands have asked me to design shorts for them. I'm not sure about that. I don't want to have them as a mass product, and suddenly everybody is walking around in them.
What's the point of shorts if they're not short?
I try and photograph people as they are. I do not want to hide anything. I want to bring across a personality, a humanity. It is not a case of model A or model B against a white background. I am interested in the person.
I wasn't aware it could make me rich or famous. I just wanted to take pictures.
For me, cinema is very important. I grew up with television; then, as a teenager, you discover cinema.
I think my strength is to act instinctively, really quickly, on what I believe, what I see in this person. A proper portrait. I wouldn't dream of doing something inappropriate for that person. I guess I make the person comfortable around me.
I am someone who takes pleasure in exploring the full scale of the medium photography. I am a photographer.
I don't really like being controlled by anyone.
There was a stage in my career when I started to have problems with the vanity aspect of the subject. I got frustrated and bored with it. Then I thought, actually, how does it feel to be photographed? That's when I started to photograph myself. That was an incredibly important moment, and it opened up my work tremendously.
I couldn't identify with the images in 'Elle' or 'Vogue' or 'Harper's Bazaar.' Nobody in the world we're walking around in actually looks like that.
