Book Review.... Could almost be an Equipment/Gear post.

I was really surprised when I found Annie Leibovitz' newer book "A Photographer's Life 1990-2005" at Cole's Bookstore on Thursday and picked it up on the spot.

I've been a big fan of hers since I saw a documentary about her career a few years ago. Her honesty about her career and early struggles and regrets was inspiring. Not to mention her amazing portraits, which is exactly what I thought I was getting when I made my purchase. I'm pleased to say that I was wrong. There are many GREAT celeb portraits that we've all seen/admired in the 500ish page book. The real meat however comes from an amazing collection of personal shots taken mainly of her family and late partner Susan.

The book is an amazing photo-essay of the disputed dual life she had lead thru the 15 year period pairing astounding professional work with the birth of her daughter, the majority and end of her close relationship with Susan and the death of her Father.

From a photographer who's work is known as the cream of the commercial crop, I was amazed by the candid and personal nature of the book. You almost get the sense of being a peeping tom into such a private and emotional part of someone's life.

I've never seen a book before that hit me the same way as this. I'd recommend this book to absolutely ANYONE who has a passion for photography.

Another reason I've posted this here is A) there's not a digital shot in the book(NANDO) and the great use of High Iso BW film thruout the personal, family shots (KEN)

I purchased Annie Leibovitz's "Annie Leibovitz at Work" around two months ago. Will comment later today as I have to go to work right now. I'm hoping that Annie Leibovitz is making some money off of these recent books to offset her current financial problems.

I've meant to rent that doc a bunch of times and never got around to it. They played it on CBC last May during CONTACT but I missed it.

I'd be interested in seeing some B&W family shots. I don't know if anyone outside of Fernando knows this but my wife and I are expecting another baby in January so I'll have another subject

I think my wife thought I'd ditch B&W film and shoot digital again but I'm thinking the opposite... I'd rather shoot MORE B&W.

Thinking about picking up a good digital point and shoot camera, though for some baby snaps.

CONGRATULATIONS KEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's great news.
Some people hire models.... Ken births them. ah ha ha ha ha...
What does your daughter think? Is she pretty excited?


Some of the family shots in the book look like they where taken by an absolute amateur with a point and shoot film camera... I love the honesty of that. I'm horrible for having beautiful shots of strangers and completely unedited personal photos that just sit around.
Other family shots are just fantastic. No crazy lighting or anything, but just beautiful ambient light compositions. It's that raw look to the personal shots, considering who they're coming from, that make them feel almost voyeuristic. (peeping tom ish.)

That documentary was REALLY inspiring for me and the book just follows thru.
It's the reason I debated putting the review under Equip/Gear. Nothing improves my shooting like inspiration from a good book. Not that you need to copy it, they just seem to drum up creativity and get you to see the world just a bit differently. Still haven't found a lens, camera body or flash set that promises or delivers that... I'll keep looking though.

My wife does most of the work, I'm just there to shoot it.

Books are great but I rarely buy them. I'd rather buy books than most magazines, though. Gear reviews don't inspire me.

Ken,
I think that you'll probably never go completely back to digital unless you're forced to. You can use the Bolex to record the birth!

Colin,
You ought to try an M3 with a 50mm or an M2 with a 35mm. Leibovitz wrote in "At Work" that she uses a Leica for her personal photography.

I buy photography books regularly. I used to buy lots of magazines (of all kinds) each month but now I put that money toward a nice photography book. I don't have many in my collection at this point - I often borrow the books. I prefer looking at books than looking at prints on a wall - perhaps because there has never been very good exhibitions here. Books have always been my main source of inspiration even when I was drawing. I get a lot of inspiration from the web but its difficult to find good stuff among all the bad. Even good photographers are often very bad editors when it comes to posting photos online. And, of course, I'm as guilty as everyone else.

I've been really into Japanese photography books since the summer. In addition to the photography, the books are so wonderfully made and thought-out that they are often works of art in and of themselves. Bought books by Daido Moriama, Akihide Tamura, Shigeichi Nagano and, of course, how could I possibly resist Noboyushi Araki's "Love by Leica". Koji Onaka's "A Dog in France" helped me considerably to look pass my big photography slump. I will likely get Kazuo Kitai's "Walking with Leica" next (for obvious reasons).

Most recently, Sanders McNew was nice enough to send me a signed copy of his new book "Double Exposures: Essays in Portraiture." It's wonderful! Sanders wrote his thoughts and reflections about portraiture and presented it along side his great photos. It gave me a new appreciation for portraiture and I can now see why this was Henri Cartier-Bresson's favourite genre of photography and also what he found to be the most difficult.

Anyway, the break is over - back to work... will comment later on Leibovitz and on Sontag. I'm afraid that because of their relationship, I now look at Annie Leibovitz's work with Susan Sontag's essays "On Photography" always in the back of my mind.

BTW, if you want to see extraordinary family photos, take a look at Bud Green's flickr stream.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bud_green/

Somewhere I've read that Leibovitz isn't an intellectual photographer but an instinctive one. I'm not sure if that's necessarily true but I find the candidness in her writing quite intriguing. In "At Work," Leibovitz writes about the story behind some of her famous photographs - the portraits of the Queen, the portrait of OJ Simpson during his trial, the photos she took of John Lennon and Yoko Ono just hours before his death, etc. The nature of her candid writing contrasts her powerful photographs. Her writing is basic and humble yet her photographs are often complex and extravagant.

Her partner, Susan Sontag, was the uttermost intellectual. Her writings on photography were very important, influential and thought provoking. I was once talking with another photographer about philosophical books on photography and he said that Susan Songtag's "On Photography" was the first book that made him hate (some aspects of) photography. "On Photography" was published in 1977. Leibovitz and Sontag first met in 1989. I've always wondered how they influenced each other.

One of the things that Sontag wrote was an essay called the "The Heroism of Vision" and I look at Leibovitz's work, especially the Vanity Fair photos, I often think about this piece of writing. In it Sontag claims that the history of photography can be seen as the struggle between the need to beautify and the need to tell the truth. Not only truth in terms of showing how something really looks like physically but also in revealing character and in revealing the true nature of a situation. Take Leibovitz's photograph of the senior staff of the Bush Administration - I see an old boy's club, arrogant and unapologetic. A better example, perhaps, is her recent Miley Cyrus portrait, the latest controversial Leibovitz photograph.

Sontag's last book, published during the year of her death, "Regarding the Pain of Others" focuses on war photography. It has a very different view of photography than her first book on the subject. I have not read it yet.