Art, like religion, because both deal with unknown, metaphysical elements and because both are inherently concerned with death, require a form of ceremony. Everyone knows how unique each religion and its clergy around the world are in creating a ceremonial atmosphere that aids in elevation, communion, and enchantment, to put it simply. Through this atmosphere, theories and teachings are conveyed that could not be communicated otherwise by religion. Art requires the same; hence, the way you set up an exhibition, the way you construct a book, the way you use a space for a performance, and the lighting all contribute to creating a dimension of ceremony. I will never forget, when I was young, how impressed I was at the small theater of the Art Theatre during performances by Koun when the lights would go out and the actors entered into darkness, then suddenly the lights would turn on, and we saw the beginning of the play. That was a brilliant dimension of ceremony. Photography has the smallest potential for ceremony because its means are very poor and limited. It is very easy, very fast, and as technology advances, the element of ceremony is diminished. We used to have the ceremony of preparing glass plates, then came film, the large cameras and the flash, the tripods, and the significant ceremony of the darkroom. All these are gone. One cannot speak of ceremony in front of a computer at home. Nor can one speak of ceremony when we machine-gun our subjects with our cameras. And there is no point in denying the great contribution of technology to ease and cost reduction, and it would be illogical to try to revive a now useless, imaginary ceremony. The solution is one: each of us must establish our own ceremony, knowing how to respect our own rules, how to go out to photograph, in what way, with which camera, what to carry along, what thought preceded which is also part of the ceremony. What to do when returning from photographing, how to deal with the photos, at what pace to reject or accept them. All these are parts of a personal ceremony that I think each of us must respect, and at the same time, there is also a ceremony in how we present the photos. Because this too has been lost through the internet. The ceremony of the exhibition has been lost, the ceremony of the openings since all photos are uploaded almost without selection on the internet. I believe that every serious process in our life, such as a romantic encounter, the joy of being with someone, a meal, requires a ceremony. I was not, nor am I opposed to photography via phones, and the phones are now excellent machines, but they have the weakness of being our daily companions. It is very difficult to perform a ceremony with a partner you have with you every day. If you manage it, I have nothing against phones, but you must give them the dimension of a ceremony without which the result usually suffers.