16 July 2014

Inspirational women taking pictures

A 19th century photographer, found on Pinterest.

Instead of talking again and again of how women are so often objectified by media and the popular culture, let's look at women who have literally objectified others and made art out of it. This is a mini compilation that brings together some that dedicated their skill and film to capture conventional beauty for mainstream culture (and did it very well!) and some that observed the real life passing by, even shifted through the darker aspects of the reality.

Regina Relang (1906-1989) was an artist and a self taught photographer from Munich, Germany. She began working for Vogue in 1938 and became one of the leading German fashion photographers in the 50's and 60's.





Diane Arbus (1923-1971) was a photographer that went from a family commercial fashion photography business to a full-fledged passion for the weird, the raw, the hidden.  A version of her artistic journey is developed in Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus.




Karen Radkai was a freelance photographer that worked primarily for Vogue in the 50s and 60s. Internets know little more about her, but offer her work though.


Vivian Maier (1926-2009) was a nanny who lived in Chicago for most of her life and passed away in 2009 at the age of 83. Little more is known about her, except that she was an avid street photographer. Her work was discovered at an auction in 2007, more than 100,000 negatives and undeveloped rolls of film, sold by a storage facility who were cleaning out her locker for delinquent rent. Cannot wait to get my hands on the documentary that tells more about this thrilling discovery.



Annie Leibovitz (1949) an American portrait photographer, doing mostly very glossy celebrity photos. Many of them very good and already iconic, though.



No comments: