Quotes by
Rúnar Gunnarsson

Mental peril
If you devote yourself entirely to something, whether it's music, visual art or literature, you are of course placing yourself at risk. That's all there is to it. If you delve deeply into something, where is the reality you normally stand on? Going all-in, everything becomes a little bit precarious. Getting some idea that one is seeing into eternity. It's a mad idea, of course, but why not? If you sense the spirit of the fleeting moment so powerfully that you become part of the whole.

Eternity in a moment
In photography one perceives, somehow, the progress of time. Time that rushes past at fearful speed and is gone. There is a desire to slow it down a little and see "the way it was." But not to snatch at it. Not a moment, but an eternity. And then it comes to be worth something, although that was never the intention.

Portraits
You can never take a portrait surreptitiously. The person in the picture must be willing to come over, to give themselves to the picture. It's a bond. And if you can't establish that bond, don't bother clicking the shutter. You won't get a photo without that bond. Sometimes I can take a photo in a moment, and sometimes not at all. The subject is somehow on their guard. Don't ask me to explain what it is. Either it is or it isn't.

You get nothing for nothing
You have to work. You get nothing for nothing. Carry your camera wherever you go, and keep on taking pictures. Its just like a good trumpeter who doesn't practise for three days: the other musicians will hear the difference. If you don't practise for a week, everyone will hear it. If you don't practise for one day, you'll hear it yourself. It's just the same.

Raw materials
I always developed my pictures myself. I go and take a photo down on Austurstrati, but the image comes into existence in the darkroom: the develop-ing, the exposure, what grade of paper one uses - soft, standard, or hard. The film was just the raw material. Then the diamond has to be polished. It's something you develop over the years - an instinct that arises from experience and strict self-discipline.