"Character, like a photograph, develops in darkness"
About this Quote
Karsh borrows the darkroom’s alchemy to argue that who we are gets made offstage. In photography, darkness isn’t a vibe; it’s a condition of transformation. The latent image exists, invisible, until it’s processed. By pairing “character” with “photograph,” he frames morality and identity as something you don’t announce into existence. You earn it through exposure, pressure, and time - then it appears, often to other people before it feels real to you.
The intent is partly professional creed, partly quiet rebuke to performative virtue. Karsh made his name photographing the powerful - Churchill’s bulldog glare, the sculpted authority of statesmen and artists - and he understood how easily “character” gets confused with “presentation.” His line insists that the real work happens when the lights are off: private discipline, grief, failure, temptation, the long stretch where no applause is available. That’s the subtext: if your decency only shows up when it’s seen, it’s not character; it’s branding.
The metaphor also flatters the medium without making it mystical. A photograph “develops” through chemistry; character “develops” through experience that can feel like chemical burn: isolation, uncertainty, the kind of shadowed period people later call formative. Karsh, an Armenian immigrant who built a life through painstaking craft, is pointing to a truth his portraits imply but can’t prove: the face can be lit, but the person is forged elsewhere.
The intent is partly professional creed, partly quiet rebuke to performative virtue. Karsh made his name photographing the powerful - Churchill’s bulldog glare, the sculpted authority of statesmen and artists - and he understood how easily “character” gets confused with “presentation.” His line insists that the real work happens when the lights are off: private discipline, grief, failure, temptation, the long stretch where no applause is available. That’s the subtext: if your decency only shows up when it’s seen, it’s not character; it’s branding.
The metaphor also flatters the medium without making it mystical. A photograph “develops” through chemistry; character “develops” through experience that can feel like chemical burn: isolation, uncertainty, the kind of shadowed period people later call formative. Karsh, an Armenian immigrant who built a life through painstaking craft, is pointing to a truth his portraits imply but can’t prove: the face can be lit, but the person is forged elsewhere.
Quote Details
| Topic | Resilience |
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