- Hardcover: 248 pages
- Publisher: Random House; 1 edition (Oct 19 1999)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0375500200
- ISBN-13: 978-0375500206
- Product Dimensions: 32.4 x 25.6 x 2.6 cm
- Shipping Weight: 2 Kg
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
#385,267 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #6 in Books > Arts & Photography > Artists, A-Z > ( J-L ) > Leibovitz, Annie
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
Each of the extraordinary portraits made by photographer Annie Leibovitz for her book Women stands on its own. Looked at together, these "photographs of people with nothing more in common than that they are women (and living in America at the end of the twentieth century), all--well almost all--fully clothed," writes Susan Sontag in the book's preface, form "an anthology of destinies and disabilities and new possibilities." Leibovitz, who in her years working for Rolling Stone, Vogue, and Vanity Fair magazines has photographed hundreds of celebrities, turns her lens on a wide range of ordinary and extraordinary female subjects: coal miners, socialites, first ladies, artists, domestic-violence victims, an astronaut, a surgeon, a maid. What she creates is a reflection of contemporary American womanhood that mirrors both women's accomplishments and the challenges they still face individually and as a group.
Leibovitz demonstrates her own range as a photographer in this body of work, shooting in the studio and natural settings and working in both black-and-white and color film. She depicts model Jerry Hall wearing a little black dress, a fur coat, and high heels, staring frankly at the viewer from a velvet chair in a plush red parlor while her naked infant son nurses from her exposed right breast. Schoolteacher Lamis Srour's eyes--the only part of her face visible behind her heavy black veil--illuminate a dark black-and-white portrait. Leibovitz frames actress Elizabeth Taylor and her dog Sugar by their shocks of snow-white hair. She captures four Kilgore College Rangerettes, a drill team, at the apex of their kicks--white-booted legs pointing up, obscuring their faces and revealing the red underpants beneath their blue miniskirts. There are many more wonderful and unexpected images here, over 200 in all. The delight in discovering them awaits readers. --Jordana Moskowitz
From School Library Journal
-To look upon the faces of the women photographed in this collection of more than 200 portraits is to marvel at and admire the intensity and dignity of the personalities represented. The subjects depicted encompass every imaginable field of endeavor. There are aerialists, writers, coal miners, battered women, and socialites, to name a few. They range from anonymous to well known. Leibovitz has become a celebrity in her own right since starting her career at Rolling Stone and then moving on to work at Vogue and Vanity Fair. She is well known for her photographs of some of the icons of 20th-century culture-rock stars, movie stars, politicians, athletes, and novelists, as well as many other famous figures, often posing her subjects in unconventional and surprising ways. Sontag's thought-provoking essay gives further insight and explanation. Young adults will be inspired, challenged, and moved both by the accomplishments and situations of the women photographed, as well as by the skill and eye of the artist who captured their images.
Turid Teague, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Turid Teague, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Image as Everywoman,
By
This review is from: Women (Hardcover)
Fiction is my preference when writing book reviews, because I love the complexity of words, stories, and the vagaries of human nature with its endless permutations. But when I received Leibovitz's astonishing compilation of photographs as a gift, I thought I might attempt an impression of page after page of females, as seen through the professional eye of one of the most important photographers of our generation.Who has not gazed in awe at Leibovitz's unusual perspective, the beautiful made even more so? But I want real women with wrinkles and dirt under their fingernails, the kind of women overlooked in the rush to worship human perfection. I want to see if there is a balance, not just the too thin, too gorgeous, too self-indulgent. In that regard, I believe Women contains a preponderance of well-groomed elegance, albeit impressive, for instance a breathtaking portrait of Gwyneth Paltrow and her mother, Blythe Danner. This particular image contrasts a young woman in the blush of her feminine power with the graceful progression of years that adds to a woman's complex attraction. To be sure, there are folios of celebrities, socialites, all those who live in the rarified strata of entitlement. While not as numerous, the presentation of real women like me, those who inhabit my world, are so powerful as to diminish the bland compositions of society's darlings. The studies of abused women jump off the pages, eyes glazed, the immediacy of domestic violence tattooing their faces, staring into a future devoid of hope; a remarkably insightful photograph of Ellen DeGeneris, virtually unrecognizable under a layer of cracked white greasepaint; two pre-adolescent girls in the back of a pickup truck, displaying a row of leggy blonde Barbie's, with Ken in a faux high school letter jacket, his plastic Prom Queen sporting a crown atop hair that cascades down the length of her body; three young Latino women glare accusingly at the lens, displaying gang colors with pride, ambiguously dangerous; the lines of age score lived-in faces, eyes shadowed by years of struggle, etched finally by the exhaustion of daily survival. For me, these pictures contain the essence of womanhood, untainted by ubiquitous vanities. In all, Leibovitz "sees" these women, their strengths, frailties and vulnerabilities. This series of images is a walk through the multi-hued, textured world of women, esoteric, generous, often brutally honest and unflinching. Luan Gaines/2004.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A moving and exceptional book,
By Dina Gidron (zur hadassah Israel) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Women (Paperback)
This is definately my favorite book, and one I enjoy giving to special women friends. Annie Leibowitz has managed to capture the full spectrum of women, from the subdued and simple to the succesful and sophisticated. It is a moving book and a celebration to women's individuality and uniqueness. I warmly recommend it.
2.0 out of 5 stars
Just a name,
By A Customer
This review is from: Women (Paperback)
Although the idea of this book is worthwhile, I am amazed to find so many of the images out of focus. She is supposed to be a fine photographer, but maybe it is this title that has allowed her to feel okay with displaying such poor examples of portraits. It seems she rushed through the work just to get the book published as I don't sense that she put too much heart into the work.
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