I chose to review Annie Leibovitz. In particular, I spent a while looking at a collection of her photographs in a book called Women, which is edited and put together with Susan Sontag. I was going to find a more obscure photographer on the Internet but this book caught my eye and I have been doing a lot of reading in another class about gender so I figured I might find this particularly interesting. I had very mixed feelings about her photography. Leibovitz is pretty well known for photographing people, and creating photographs that convey an intense relationship between the camera and the person being photographed. In this case in particular, I studied a particular body of her work that focused on women, but I also spent some time looking at other famous photographs of hers to get a good idea about her entire body of work (which is quite large.) I have to admit, though she is VERY well known, I had never really taken the time to have some opinions about her work.
I think a lot of her photography tells a truth about people that is sometimes less than comfortable. That said, I think sometimes it also tells a truth about who people WANT to be or who WE want people to be as opposed to who they actually are, but I am not sure that that is any less relevant. I noticed that I much prefer the pictures that are less “happy.” I find them to be more intimate yet simultaneously more mysterious, which makes me study them longer. I think Leibovitz does an exceptional job capturing the story of a person in their body language. In many of her more posed photographs she plays a lot with the light in the room, which I think adds to the composition of the photo, but also makes it more staged, which is less unusual in my opinion. I am also very impressed by Leibovitz’s ability to cover a large sample of people without making it feel stereotypically “inclusive.” This is probably partially due to her renowned status, but I think it also has to do with how she sees the world. Her photography is very simply composed, and the subject as far as I have seen, is always human. I think what makes her so successful, is how simple her photography seems at first, but how intricate it is when you look again. Leibovitz takes photos of things that people have opinions about, but she manages to leave her opinion out very skillfully, and let her audience make their own judgments. I like the way Leibovitz uses skin. I think its daring and coveys a variety of emotions (depending on the picture) without destroying the rest of the picture. I also get these sense that Leibovitz has really mastered the power that the eyes of her subject have on her story and the picture’s composition. I like her work a lot, I think it is an interesting study in people, but she has a very particular style and studying Leibovitz eventually left me really wanting to look at something different. I wonder if she ever feels that way.
I agree with you Sophia. I think that her pictures that are more “sad” are more interesting and create a better relationship between the camera and the subject. I also like her use of black and white photography in the examples that you posted on your blog.