Annie Leibovitz (image analysis)

Annie Leibovitz

Photographer Annie Leibovitz was born October 2, 1949, in Waterbury, Connecticut. In 1970 she took a job at Rolling Stone magazine. In 1983 she began working for the entertainment magazine Vanity Fair. During the late 1980s, Leibovitz started to work on a number of high-profile advertising campaigns. From the 1990s to the present, she has been publishing and exhibiting her work.

Rolling Stone Magazine

 

She was one of the six children born to Sam, an Air Force lieutenant, and Marilyn Leibovitz, a modern dance instructor. In 1967, Leibovitz enrolled at the San Francisco Art Institute, where (although initially studying painting) she developed a love for photography.

After living briefly on an Israeli kibbutz, Leibovitz returned to the U.S., in 1970, and applied for a job with the start-up rock music magazine Rolling Stone. Impressed with Leibovitz’s portfolio, editor Jann Wenner offered her a job as a staff photographer. Within two years, the 23-year-old Leibovitz was promoted to chief photographer - a title she would hold for the next 10 years. Her position with the magazine afforded her the opportunity to accompany the Rolling Stones band on their 1975 international tour.

Vanity Fair

In 1983, Leibovitz left Rolling Stone and began working for the entertainment magazine Vanity Fair. With a wider array of subjects, Leibovitz’s photographs for Vanity Fair ranged from presidents to literary icons to teen heartthrobs. To date, a number of Vanity Faircovers have featured Leibovitz’s stunning - and often controversial - portraits of celebrities. Demi Moore (very pregnant and very nude) and Whoopi Goldberg  (half-submerged in a bathtub of milk) are among the most remembered actresses to grace the cover in recent years. Known for her ability to make her sitters become physically involved in her work, one of Leibovitz’s most famous portraits is of the late artist Keith Haring, who painted himself like one of his canvases for the photo.

Later Work

Widely considered one of America’s best portrait photographers, Annie Leibovitz published the book Women (1999), which was accompanied by an essay by friend and novelist Susan Sontag. With its title subject matter, Leibovitz presented an array of female images from Supreme Court Justices to Vegas showgirls to coal miners and farmers. Currently, many of her original prints are housed in various galleries throughout the United States.

In 2005, the Brooklyn Museum of Art did a retrospective on her work entitled "Annie Leibovitz: A Photographer’s Life, 1990-2005." As busy as ever, Annie Leibovitz continues to be in demand as portrait photographer, often capturing arresting images of today’s celebrities.

Annie Leibovitz is the mother of three children. At the age of 51, she had her daughter, Sarah. In 2005, her twin daughters, Susan and Samuelle, were born with the help of a surrogate mother.

Demi Moore: Naked & Pregnant, August 1991 – Vanity Fair 

Shot by famous celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz, this 1991 Vanity Fair cover featured Demi Moore, who was the first celebrity to appear naked and pregnant on the cover of a magazine. Moore, then 28, and then-husband Bruce Willis were expecting their second child that August. The now famous pose would later be copied by other celebrities such as Cindy Crawford, Britney Spears and Jessica Simpson.

The photograph has a very strong story behind it, this is what made the Vanity Fair magazine take off, because it was the first shot of the most famous celebrity been naked in the history of magazine. The communication you get from this photograph is when you see it, you’re eye catches her stomach been blown up with pregnancy and it’s that big that she has to hold it up with left hand of course the other hand is covering her private area. This is a very important piece of work I think because it’s basically about bringing another human into life and on the other hand it relates to history because eventually the baby born could always look back at this photo which would be a really good memory to have for a parent and her child. It shows the story of a mother going through so much to just to give birth to her child. However the other thing I could think of is to why would she show her private life to the public’s eye, is it something to do with fame, because she could just have the image in her album at home…

Although this piece of photograph does make you investigate further, it’s like half the story has been told and the other half is left. Because you want to know what the baby would be, is it a boy or a girl for instance, if a girl would she be as attractive as her mother. Is that her natural skin colour or has she been in the sunbath before this image had been taken. As the viewer you start to ask yourself a lot of different questions. If you want to know the answer you have to wait until the baby is born. The artist has hidden the story behind this image.

The only symbol I can see on this image is the jewellery ring on her middle finger and the earing she’s got on. Which make you want to explore further to see what’s on the other hand, is she married or not, for instance if you didn’t know the person. I think the artist again is trying to hide the information and the artist want you to interpret what’s all the work about, is it just a memory or a claim to fame by showing herself naked to the public’s eye.

Also the work has a title which shows what it’s all about and what it’s based on which is “vanity Fair” a big magazine company, however what I think is good that it has the date on the front page of the magazine “August 1991” on the other hand they’ve got some information about “how saddam survived” which gives you more idea about when the magazine was made. The title doesn’t suggest anything else apart from the person’s name “More Demi Morre” which basically saying that she’s done it before, it’s not her first time!

Besides I think the colour the artist has used in this image is very important because you get more detail about the person, however the big title “VANITY FAIR” I personally think goes very well with the colour of the skin of Demi Moore but the background is a darkish deemed colour, this is because the artist wants to set the focus of our eye on the person not the background which a portrait should be about. However what I like about this is that artist has chosen her colours very carefully, so they match well, her diamond earring and the ring on her finger matches very well with the white coloured typography she’s used, which makes the image look very simple, because the artist wants your eye to catch the person before you read what’s going on. If for instance artist had used a lot of different colours then I don’t think these would’ve made the person stand out as much, I think as an artist the simpler you create something the better it looks, but you have to really good at what you’re trying to get to the viewers.

As an artist you have to present your work in a very important way, because you want to attract different eyes to your final piece, you want to make people see what’s going on. For instance what you want the viewers to look at you make it stand out from the background or set the focus into the thing you want people to see. Also I think the artist kind of used the rule of thirds in this photo, this is to put most of the body on one side of the image and her belly on the other side, to balance it out however, the space between “VANITY and FAIR” is where her head is placed, this is a good promotion for the company’s name, so she’s not covering anything important apart from the Y and a bit of the F.

I think the technique the artist has used looks simple for example most artist uses light from the side of the object to get shadows of the bend, but in this image I think she’s just used a normal camera flash or an extended flash face to face to the person. This is to set our eye focus on the person’s stomach and her body. Also the good thing is that the artist makes the person stand sideways which covers most of her private sections up and she’s got her hand on her boobs which make you think she’s hiding something. The other good thing about standing sideways is that she’s displaying the size of her belly is and it gives you a rough idea about how long away the baby might be.