It is the camera’s job to capture light, but on occasion it can capture the truth. This is not done on accident, but through sheer unadulterated skill from photographers like Richard Avedon. Richard Avedon was able to produce captivating shots time and time again, knowing the perfect means necessary to show the world a new form of controversial beauty, one that contains “stark imagery and brilliant insight into his subjects’ character” (PBS) . For more than fifty years Richard Avedon’s portraits have filled some of the country’s finest magazines, and will go down in history as one of the most influential American photographers.
Avedon was born May 15th, 1923 in New York, child to Anna Avedon and Jacob Israel Avedon. Both his parents worked in the fashion industry in their own clothing store on Fifth Avenue. “Inspired by his parents’ clothing businesses, as a boy Avedon took a great interest in Fashion, especially enjoying photographing the clothes in his father’s stores” (Biography). His mother was extremely supportive of his interests, and at the age of 12, Avedon joined the Young Men’s Hebrew Association (YMHA) Camera Club. Avedon would use is family’s Kodak Box Brownie to capture the world he was so curious about. One of his first muses was his sister, Louise, who was a “beautiful subject to capture on film” (Wikipedia). His sister had always struggled, but was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia. These experiences of fashion and tragedy shaped his later photography style.
Richard Avedon spent his high school years at DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx, where he started work on the school paper, The Magpie. It was then that he discovered his affinity towards poetry during his senior year, and in 1941, he was named...
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...ot only the subject in them, but the talented photographer as well.
“Sometimes I think all my pictures are just pictures of me. My concern is… the human predicament; only what I consider the human predicament may simply be my own.”
-Richard Avedon
Works Cited
Hill, Kyerstin. "Richard Avedon." IPHF. International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum, 23 Mar. 2013. Web. 23 Apr. 2014.
"Richard Avedon." Biography. A&E Networks Television, n.d. Web. 23 Apr. 2014.
"Richard Avedon: Master Photographer - Photo Essays." Time. Time Inc., n.d. Web. 23 Apr.
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"Richard Avedon." PBS. PBS, 11 Sept. 2005. Web. 23 Apr. 2014.
"Richard Avedon." Voguepedia. Voguepedia, n.d. Web. 23 Apr. 2014.
"Richard Avedon." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 21 Apr. 2014. Web. 21 Apr. 2014.
"The Richard Avedon Foundation." The Richard Avedon Foundation. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Apr.
2014.
Born of Irish immigrants in 1823 in a little place called Warren County, New York; Mathew Brady is known as “The Father of Photojournalism.” While a student of Samuel Morse and a friend of Louis Daguerre (inventor of the “Daguerreotype,” a method of photography that the image is developed straight onto a metal coated surface), in which he had met while under the study of Morse, Brady took up his interest in photography in the year of 1839, while only seventeen years of age. Brady took what he had learned from these two talented and intellectual men to America where he furthered his interest in the then-growing art of photography.
Johnson, Brooks. Photography Speaks: 150 Photographers on their Art.” New York: Aperture Foundation Inc., 2004. Print.
Having such an image before our eyes, often we fail to recognize the message it is trying to display from a certain point of view. Through Clark’s statement, it is evident that a photograph holds a graphic message, which mirrors the representation of our way of thinking with the world sights, which therefore engages other
It’s his compassion for his subjects and his commitment to them that surpasses the act of making a pretty picture. Spending days with his subjects in the slums of Harlem or the hardly developed mountains of West Virginia, he immerses himself into the frequently bitter life of his next award-winning photo. Often including word for word text of testimonials recorded by junkies and destitute farmers, Richards is able to provide an unbiased portrayal. All he has done is to select and make us look at the faces of the ignored, opinions and reactions left to be made by the viewer. Have you ever been at the beach safely shielded by a dark pair of sunglasses and just watched?
Gustavon, Todd. Camera: A History of Photography from daguerreotype to Digital. New York, NY: Sterling Publishing, 2009
Probably one of the most influential photographers of the 21st century, Sally Mann has been a great success in the world of photography of the last decade and a half. Mann is considered one of the best black and white female photographers in the field and was even named “America’s Best Photographer” by Time Magazine in 2001. Mann’s photographs are alluring and intriguing for viewers, offering a new interpretation on how others normally perceive the different aspects of life. It is important however, to first take a look at how Mann got started.
Photography and portraiture is a powerful medium for art. Through photography and portraiture we are able to capture the essence and being of individuals and moments. Many artists that primarily work within these genres do so for that very reason. Famous photographer Robert Mapplethorpe was no different, using his photographs to capture portraits of the various characters that made up the fabric of his social existence as a gay white male living in New York City. Robert Mapplethorpe, as a member of a fringe lifestyle and culture within America, wanted to utilize his work to bring to the public conscious, recognition and appreciation of these fringe groups and cultures, even if it required shocking depictions and imagery.
The essay How You See Yourself by Nicholas Mirzoeff discusses the evolution of art. The author discusses the use of art to represent changing identities over the years including cultural practices and societal expectations. The selfie, according to Nicholas Mirzoeff’s essay, is the equivalent of a self-portrait in the previous centuries preceding the technological development required for the present day selfie. The essay explores the different periods and the significance of art, particularly self-portraits, the selfies of the time, and their development over time. The author focuses on different themes including heroism, gender definition, and the focus of an image. Mirzoeff effectively provides examples illustrating and reinforcing the themes he highlights in his essay.
Joseph Cornell was born in New York. He was the oldest child of four including two sisters, Elizabeth and Helen, and a brother, Robert who suffered from cerebral palsy. Cornell dedicated his life to caring for Robert, which was another strand in his lack of relationships. Although he conveyed attraction to unreachable women, his shyness made romantic relationships almost impossible. He was cautious of strangers. This steered him to isolate himself and became a self-taught artist. (Wikipedia, 2015) “Using the surrealist technique of unexpected juxtaposition, his best-known work were boxed assemblages created from found objects. These are simple shadow boxes, usually fronted with a glass pane, in which he arranged eclectic fragments of photographs, in a way that combines the formal austerity of Constructivism with the lively fantasy of Surrealism.” (The Art Story, 2015)
It was not until a trip to Japan with her mother after her sophomore year of studying painting at the San Francisco Art Institute that Annie Leibovitz discovered her interest in taking photographs. In 1970 Leibovitz went to the founding editor of Rolling Stone, Jann Wenner, who was impressed by Leibovitz’s work. Leibovitz’s first assignment from Wenner was to shoot John Lennon. Leibovitz’s black-and-white portrait of Lennon was the cover of the January 21, 1971 issue. Ironically, Leibovitz would be the last person to capture her first celebrity subject. Two years later she made history by being named Rolling Stone’s first female chief photographer. Leibovitz’s intimate photographs of celebrities had a big part in defining the Rolling Stone look. In 1983 Leibovitz joined Vanity Fair and was made the magazine’s first contributing photographer. At Vanity Fair she became known for her intensely lit, staged, and alluring portraits of celebrities. With a broader range of subjects available at Vanity Fair, Leibovitz’s photographs for Vanity Fair ranged from presidents to literary icons to t...
“ The self's struggle for authenticity and definition will never end unless it's connected to its creator -- to you and to me. And that can happen with awareness -- awareness of the reality of oneness and the projection of self-hood. For a start, we can think about all the times when we do lose ourselves.”
Photography is commonly associated with fact, yet it has been a medium for fiction since its invention. Henry Peach Robinson was a Pictorialist photographer in the 1800s who was notable for his combination prints where h...
The book “On Photography” by Susan Sontag, she expresses several views and ideas about photography to educate us further about her views. In Sontag’s view, “To collect photographs is to collect the world” (Sontag 3). In other words, Sontag believes that the photograph that is taken will always be a photograph within society in his/her own world. I interpret the quote this way because if our life is captured in photographs, that’s our whole world. Even though we are capturing it through the lenses, we are still experiencing it some how, some way.
She began actively pursuing the strange in the early 1960s. Arbus would camp out in New York’s gritty streets, seeking out sideshow carnivals and transexual clubs. She caught children off-kilter in the park, saw regular people on bad days and good and she sought out the marginalised along the Lower East Side. In the cases of Woman with a beehive hairdo and Girl in a watch cap (both 1965), Arbus didn’t even bother to disguise the tears and marks on her negatives. Such was the emotional authenticity of her work; as many have noted, it was her belief that the more specific a photograph of something was the less general its messages became. For the most part, Arbus uses her camera not to comment or judge her subjects, but as a “license to enter the specifics of other people’s
Works of Sophie Calle has appeared in several media across the US and Europe (Yve-Alain Bois, 1). Her works have been described to leverage on the use of constraints which is reminiscent of the French literary cult Oulipo of which she was a member. Sphie’s works are are a reflection of her personal life, where she tries to create a link between her intimate moments and her art (www.egs.edu). Sophie employs a unique and unconventional form of photography that has made her standout in the art circles. Her natural tendency to be contentious has made her works what they are. From mode of execution to exhibition Sophie marks a different role for her kind of work.