Annie Liebovitz attends an exhibit of her work in Soho, New York, New York, on November 21, 1974. (Photo by Fred W. McDarrah)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
1975
Memphis, Tennessee, USA
Annie Leibovitz in Memphis, Tennessee, during the Rolling Stones Tour of the Americas, 1975. (Photo by Christopher Simon Sykes)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
1975
Annie Leibovitz during the Rolling Stones Tour of the Americas, 1975. (Photo by Christopher Simon Sykes)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
1975
Hollywood, CA, USA
Annie Leibovitz, Hollywood, California, 1975. (Photo by Lawrence Schiller)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
1986
1501 Broadway, New York, NY 10036, United States
Annie Leibovitz smiles as she appears at the Art AID auction held at the Hard Rock Cafe, New York, New York, March 1986. Celebrated artists donated artwork for the benefit of the malnourished in Africa. (Photo by Tom Gates)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
1989
3 Brewster Rd, Newark, NJ 07114, United States
Ron Galella and Annie Leibovitz attend Vanity Fair Magazine Photo Shoot on September 22, 1989, at the Newark Airport in Newark, New Jersey. (Photo by Ron Galella, Ltd.)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
1992
Annie Leibovitz, 1992. (Photo by Rose Hartman)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2002
New York, the United States
Annie Leibovitz in New York, the United States on April 02, 2002.
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2004
Tribeca, New York City, NY, USA
Annie Leibovitz and Robert De Niro during Annie Leibovitz Photo Shoot with Robert De Niro - November 18, 2004, at Tribeca, New York City in New York City, New York, United States. (Photo by James Devaney)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2005
St. Martin's Pl, Charing Cross, London WC2H 0HE, United Kingdom
Annie Liebowitz at the National Portrait Gallery in London, circa 2005. (Photo by Judith Burrows)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2012
881 7th Ave, New York, NY 10019, United States
Annie Leibovitz attends the 22nd annual Glamour Women of the Year Awards at Carnegie Hall on November 12, 2012, in New York City. (Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2013
Teatro Campoamor, Calle Pelayo, 3, 33003 Oviedo, Asturias, Spain
Annie Leibovitz attends the "Prince of Asturias Awards 2013" ceremony at the Campoamor Theater on October 25, 2013, in Oviedo, Spain. (Photo by Carlos Alvarez)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2014
8221 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90046, United States
Annie Leibovitz attends The Annie Leibovitz SUMO-Size Book Launch presented by Vanity Fair, Leon Max, and Benedikt Taschen during Vanity Fair Campaign Hollywood at Chateau Marmont on February 26, 2014, in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Rachel Murray)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2016
London, England, UK
Annie Leibovitz attends the Press Preview of "WOMEN: New Portraits" The Wapping Project on January 13, 2016, in London, England. (Photo by Mike Marsland)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2016
Rancho Palos Verdes, CA, USA
Annie Leibovitz speaks at the AOL 2016 MAKERS conference at Terranea Resort on February 2, 2016, in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2016
Tokyo, Japan
Annie Leibovitz speaks at the press conference for her exhibition "WOMEN: New Portraits" at TOLOT/heuristic SHINONOME on February 17, 2016, in Tokyo, Japan. (Photo by Koki Nagahama)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2016
12P Smithfield, Kennedy Town, Hong Kong
Annie Lebovitz speaks at her UBS commissioned exhibition, WOMEN: New Portraits, to be held at Cheung Hing Industrial Building, Kennedy Town in Hong Kong 3 - 26 June 2016, on May 31, 2016, in Hong Kong. (Photo by Anthony Kwan)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2016
Milan, Italy
Annie Leibovitz attends the press conference of WOMEN: New Portraits By Annie Leibovitz, Commissioned By UBS on September 6, 2016, in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Matteo Valle)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2016
550 W 20th St, New York, NY 10011, United States
Annie Leibovitz attends Annie Leibovitz's "Women: New Portraits" Exhibition Opens In New York on November 15, 2016, at the former Bayview Correctional Facility in New York City. The exhibition was commissioned by UBS. (Photo by Roy Rochlin)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2017
55 Bloor St W, Toronto, ON M4W 1A5, Canada
Annie Leibovitz attends Annie Leibovitz: Portraits 2005-2016 Book Signing at Indigo Manulife Centre on November 2, 2017, in Toronto, Canada. (Photo by George Pimentel)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2017
55 Bloor St W, Toronto, ON M4W 1A5, Canada
Annie Leibovitz attends Annie Leibovitz: Portraits 2005-2016 Book Signing at Indigo Manulife Centre on November 2, 2017, in Toronto, Canada. (Photo by George Pimentel)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2019
1000 5th Ave, New York, NY 10028, United States
Annie Leibovitz (2nd L) with daughters Sarah Cameron Leibovitz, Samuelle Rhinebeck, and Susan Leibovitz attend The 2019 Met Gala Celebrating Camp: Notes on Fashion at Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 06, 2019, in New York City. (Photo by Neilson Barnard)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2019
New York City, NY, USA
Annie Leibovitz discusses the new camera features on the new Google Pixel 4 smartphone during a Google launch event on October 15, 2019, in New York City. (Photo by Drew Angerer)
Gallery of Annie Leibovitz
2019
8th and G Streets, Washington, DC 20001, United States
Annie Leibovitz and Vogue Magazine editor-in-chief Anna Wintour attend the 2019 American Portrait Gala at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery on November 17, 2019, in Washington, DC. (Photo by Shannon Finney)
Achievements
Membership
Awards
Prince of Asturias Award for Communication
2013
Leibovitz with her Prince of Asturias Award for Communication
Annie Leibovitz smiles as she appears at the Art AID auction held at the Hard Rock Cafe, New York, New York, March 1986. Celebrated artists donated artwork for the benefit of the malnourished in Africa. (Photo by Tom Gates)
Ron Galella and Annie Leibovitz attend Vanity Fair Magazine Photo Shoot on September 22, 1989, at the Newark Airport in Newark, New Jersey. (Photo by Ron Galella, Ltd.)
Annie Leibovitz and Robert De Niro during Annie Leibovitz Photo Shoot with Robert De Niro - November 18, 2004, at Tribeca, New York City in New York City, New York, United States. (Photo by James Devaney)
Annie Leibovitz attends the 22nd annual Glamour Women of the Year Awards at Carnegie Hall on November 12, 2012, in New York City. (Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris)
Teatro Campoamor, Calle Pelayo, 3, 33003 Oviedo, Asturias, Spain
Annie Leibovitz attends the "Prince of Asturias Awards 2013" ceremony at the Campoamor Theater on October 25, 2013, in Oviedo, Spain. (Photo by Carlos Alvarez)
8221 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90046, United States
Annie Leibovitz attends The Annie Leibovitz SUMO-Size Book Launch presented by Vanity Fair, Leon Max, and Benedikt Taschen during Vanity Fair Campaign Hollywood at Chateau Marmont on February 26, 2014, in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Rachel Murray)
Annie Leibovitz attends the Press Preview of "WOMEN: New Portraits" The Wapping Project on January 13, 2016, in London, England. (Photo by Mike Marsland)
Annie Leibovitz speaks at the AOL 2016 MAKERS conference at Terranea Resort on February 2, 2016, in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez)
Annie Leibovitz speaks at the press conference for her exhibition "WOMEN: New Portraits" at TOLOT/heuristic SHINONOME on February 17, 2016, in Tokyo, Japan. (Photo by Koki Nagahama)
Annie Lebovitz speaks at her UBS commissioned exhibition, WOMEN: New Portraits, to be held at Cheung Hing Industrial Building, Kennedy Town in Hong Kong 3 - 26 June 2016, on May 31, 2016, in Hong Kong. (Photo by Anthony Kwan)
Annie Leibovitz attends the press conference of WOMEN: New Portraits By Annie Leibovitz, Commissioned By UBS on September 6, 2016, in Milan, Italy. (Photo by Matteo Valle)
Annie Leibovitz attends Annie Leibovitz's "Women: New Portraits" Exhibition Opens In New York on November 15, 2016, at the former Bayview Correctional Facility in New York City. The exhibition was commissioned by UBS. (Photo by Roy Rochlin)
Annie Leibovitz attends Annie Leibovitz: Portraits 2005-2016 Book Signing at Indigo Manulife Centre on November 2, 2017, in Toronto, Canada. (Photo by George Pimentel)
Annie Leibovitz attends Annie Leibovitz: Portraits 2005-2016 Book Signing at Indigo Manulife Centre on November 2, 2017, in Toronto, Canada. (Photo by George Pimentel)
Annie Leibovitz (2nd L) with daughters Sarah Cameron Leibovitz, Samuelle Rhinebeck, and Susan Leibovitz attend The 2019 Met Gala Celebrating Camp: Notes on Fashion at Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 06, 2019, in New York City. (Photo by Neilson Barnard)
Annie Leibovitz discusses the new camera features on the new Google Pixel 4 smartphone during a Google launch event on October 15, 2019, in New York City. (Photo by Drew Angerer)
8th and G Streets, Washington, DC 20001, United States
Annie Leibovitz and Vogue Magazine editor-in-chief Anna Wintour attend the 2019 American Portrait Gala at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery on November 17, 2019, in Washington, DC. (Photo by Shannon Finney)
(Brings together a collection of seventy photographs - inc...)
Brings together a collection of seventy photographs - including portraits of musicians, actors, writers, and other celebrated personalities of American popular culture - taken by the chief photographer for "Rolling Stone" magazine over the past fifteen years.
(The impulse to do American Music writes famed photographe...)
The impulse to do American Music writes famed photographer Annie Leibovitz, "came from a desire to return to my original subject and look at it with a mature eye. Bring my experience to it…make it a real American tapestry."
(A pilgrimage took Annie Leibovitz to places that she coul...)
A pilgrimage took Annie Leibovitz to places that she could explore with no agenda. She wasn’t on assignment. She chose the subjects simply because they meant something to her.
(Portraits of well-known figures - Johnny Cash, Nicole Kid...)
Portraits of well-known figures - Johnny Cash, Nicole Kidman, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Keith Richards, Michael Jordan, Joan Didion, R2-D2, Patti Smith, Nelson Mandela, Jack Nicholson, William Burroughs, George W. Bush with members of his Cabinet - appear alongside pictures of Leibovitz’s family and friends, reportage from the siege of Sarajevo in the early Nineties, and landscapes made even more indelible through Leibovitz’s discerning eye.
Annie Leibovitz is an American portrait photographer, whose photographs have appeared in a number of magazines and publications. In 1983, she began working for the entertainment magazine Vanity Fair, continuing to produce images that would be deemed iconic and provocative. Having also worked on high-profile advertising campaigns, Leibovitz's images have been showcased in several books and major exhibitions around the world.
Background
Ethnicity:
Annie Leibovitz's father’s parents were Romanian Jews who spoke Yiddish at home. Her mother was born in New York City, of Austrian Jewish and Russian Jewish descent.
Annie Leibovitz was born on October 2, 1949, in Waterbury, Connecticut, the United States, to Marilyn Edith (née Heit) and Samuel Leibovitz. Annie was one of the six children. Her father was a lieutenant colonel in the United States Air Force and her mother was a dance instructor.
Education
With a father in the armed forces, Leibovitz moved often during her youth, but one constant was the dance classes she took from her mother and other instructors. Later, when starting her career as a photographer, Leibovitz drew on her early interest in dancing. Meanwhile, Folk music captured her interest in high school. While studying at Roosevelt High School, Leibovitz became fascinated by different artistic activities and started to play and write music.
She also began taking photographs when her father was stationed in the Philippines during the Vietnam War. She enrolled at the San Francisco Art Institute to study painting. Leibovitz had no plans for a career in photography. Halfway through her painting studies, however, she vacationed in Japan and the Philippines and acquired her first camera. Photography hooked her interest immediately. She was deeply influenced by the works of photographers like Robert Frank and Henri Cartier-Bresson.
In 1970, while still a student, she was given her first commercial assignment for Rolling Stone magazine: to photograph John Lennon. Leibovitz graduated from San Francisco Art Institute in 1971 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. Post-graduation, she took up various odd jobs including a brief stint on a kibbutz in Amir, Israel.
Annie’s career as a photographer began when Jann Wenner approached her in the year 1970. The founding editor of Rolling Stone was awestruck by Annie’s portfolio. He appointed her as a staff photographer at the firm which had just started operating out of San Francisco.
Her position with the magazine afforded her the opportunity to accompany the Rolling Stones band on their 1975 international tour, though she lost herself from the experience and ended up grappling with crippling drug addiction. She became addicted to cocaine, a habit she kicked some years later when she joined the staff of Vanity Fair magazine.
While with Rolling Stone, Leibovitz developed her trademark technique, which involved the use of bold primary colors and surprising poses, as seen with a 1979 Bette Midler cover inspired by the rock music film The Rose. Leibovitz is credited with making many Rolling Stone covers collector's items, including an issue that featured a nude John Lennon curled around his fully clothed wife, Yoko Ono. Taken on December 8, 1980, Leibovitz’s Polaroid of the former Beatle was shot just hours before his death.
In 1983 Leibovitz produced a 60-print show that toured Europe and the United States. The accompanying book, Annie Leibovitz: Photographs, was a best seller. That same year she joined the staff of Vanity Fair, which broadened her pool of subjects to include film stars, athletes, and political figures.
For her portraits, Leibovitz - who viewed her photographic sessions as collaborations - typically spent days observing her subjects’ daily lives and worked to make her portraits of them unique and witty, each a technically exquisite distillation. Her commercial images were dramatic and staged rather than casual.
With a wider array of subjects, Leibovitz’s photographs for the magazine ranged from presidents to literary icons to teen heartthrobs. Leibovitz's shoots also became known for over-the-top budgets that would later be at the center of major financial challenges. To date, a number of Vanity Fair covers have featured Leibovitz’s stunning - and often controversial - portraits of celebrities.
Demi Moore (very pregnant and very nude followed by a body painting shoot), Whoopi Goldberg (half-submerged in a bathtub of milk), Sylvester Stallone (appearing nude in a pose inspired by Rodin's The Thinker) and Caitlyn Jenner (in a corset after having publicly revealed her identity as a woman) are among the most remembered celebs to grace the cover.
Known for her ability to make her sitters become physically involved in her work, another of Leibovitz’s most famous portraits is of the late artist Keith Haring, who painted himself like a canvas for the photo. During the 1980s, Leibovitz also started to work on a number of high-profile advertising campaigns.
She began to work as an advertising photographer in 1986, gaining such clients as Honda, American Express (the Portraits campaign), and the Gap (Individual of Style campaign). One of her most notable projects was for American Express, for which her portraits of celebrity cardholders like Elmore Leonard, Tom Selleck, and Luciano Pavarotti earned her a 1987 Clio Award.
In 1991, Leibovitz’s collection of more than 200 photographs were exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. She was the first woman to be so honored. Later that year, a book was published to accompany the show titled Photographs: Annie Leibovitz, 1970-1990. She later was involved in the California Milk Processor Board (the Got Milk? campaign) and shot a series of ads featuring celebrities as Disney characters for Disney theme parks.
In 1996, Leibovitz worked as the official photographer of the Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. A compilation of her black-and-white portraits of American athletes, including Carl Lewis and Michael Johnson, were published in the book Olympic Portraits.
Widely considered one of America’s best portrait photographers, Leibovitz published the book Women (1999), which was accompanied by an essay by her romantic partner, famed intellectual 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. The project is continued as a traveling exhibition, making a London debut in January 2016.
In 2003, Leibovitz published the book American Music, with an emphasis on important figures in the realm of blues, country, folk, hip-hop, and jazz. Then in 2006, the Brooklyn Museum of Art presented the retrospective Annie Leibovitz: A Photographer’s Life, 1990-2005, with a related book published as well.
In 2011 she photographed seven top female athletes for the sportswear company Nike’s Make Yourself campaign. Her style throughout these projects was characterized by carefully staged settings, superb lighting, and her trademark use of vivid color. Leibovitz continued to be in demand as a photographer, working on projects that range from a 2014 Marcs & Spencer advertising campaign to the 2016 calendar for the tire manufacturer Pirelli.
During her financial difficulties, Leibovitz began working on a personal project, photographing places, and objects that were meaningful to her, and the images were collected in the book Pilgrimage (2011). For the latter, Liebovitz chose to feature mostly clothed women from a variety of backgrounds and ages in contrast to the images of scantily clad models from previous calendars.
Annie Leibovitz is a famous portrait photographer whose photographs have appeared in a number of magazines and publications. Famous for clicking the portraits of celebrities, she began her career as a staff photographer for the Rolling Stone magazine. Her photograph of a nude John Lennon curled up with his fully clothed wife is one of her most iconic images. Her attempt to re-create a kissing scene from the album cover of Double Fantasy led to this strong picture which became her signature work.
The French Government made her Commandeur des Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1991. In the same year, she became the only woman and the second living portraitist to be featured in an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C.
She won the prestigious international advertising award, the Clio Award in 1987 for her celebrity photographs for an advertising campaign for American Express charge cards. The Royal Photographic Society presented her with the Centenary Medal for her significant contribution to the art of photography.
Despite being raised in a Jewish home, Leibovitz no longer practices Judaism. When asked if being Jewish is important to her, Leibovitz replied, "I'm not a practicing Jew, but I feel very Jewish. "
Views
Most of Annie Leibovitz’s early pictures were in black and white. However, once Rolling Stone magazine started publishing color pictures in 1974, Leibovitz had to adjust her style with the company’s style - she started using color film and learning new skills.
Annie Leibovitz once claimed that when she was in school, she was never taught and never learned anything about lighting - everything was black and white. Therefore, it was really a challenge for Leibovitz and she had to learn about color herself. Of course, she did not just leave her black and white pictures easily. When Annie Leibovitz was on tour with the Rolling Stones in 1975, she took most of the pictures in black and white. Now we can see that Leibovitz has succeeded in both styles of photography.
Quotations:
"A thing that you see in my pictures is that I was not afraid to fall in love with these people."
"The camera makes you forget you're there. It's not like you are hiding but you forget, you are just looking so much."
"If I didn't have my camera to remind me constantly, I am here to do this, I would eventually have slipped away, I think. I would have forgotten my reason to exist."
"Photography is not something you retire from."
"There's an idea that it's hard to be a woman artist. People assume that women have fewer opportunities, less power. But it's not any harder to be a woman artist than to be a male artist. We all take what we are given and use the parts of ourselves that feed the work. We make our way. Photographers, men, and women are particularly lucky. Photography lets you find yourself. It is a passport to people and places and to possibilities."
"As a young person, and I know it’s hard to believe that I was shy, but you could take your camera, and it would take you to places: it was like having a friend, like having someone to go out with and look at the world. I would do things with a camera I wouldn’t do normally if I was just by myself."
"I'm more interested in being good than being famous."
"For me, the story about the pictures is about almost losing myself, and coming back, and what it means to be deeply involved in a subject. The thing that saved me was that I had my camera by my side. It was there to remind me who I was and what I did. It separated me from them."
Personality
Annie Leibovitz used to find photographing celebrities intimidating in the beginning as they always would ask her what she wanted them to do, to which she had no answer. Her signature style has consisted of a strong collaboration between the photographer and the subject.
Interests
Artists
Robert Frank, Henri Cartier-Bresson
Sport & Clubs
Bicycling, hiking
Connections
Annie Leibovitz was in a relationship with writer Susan Sontag from 1989 until Sontag’s death in 2004. However, it was never disclosed whether their 15-year relationship was a platonic or romantic relationship because they never actually lived together.
She has three children, two of whom were born to a surrogate mother. Her first one, Sarah Cameron Leibovitz was born in October 2001 when Leibovitz was 52 years old. Her twin girls, Susan and Samuelle, were born to a surrogate mother in May 2005.
Father:
Sam Leibovitz
Mother:
Marilyn Edith (Heit) Leibovitz
Daughter:
Samuelle Leibovitz
Daughter:
Sarah Cameron Leibovitz
Daughter:
Susan Leibovitz
Partner:
Susan Sontag
Leibovitz and Susan Sontag traveled around the world together, finding interconnections with their work and end up pursuing their work even more. When interviewed for her book, an autobiography called A Photographer’s Life: 1990-2005, Leibovitz mentioned that the time and journey spent with Susan Sontag was a love story to her.
In 2007, Annie was hired by The Walt Disney Company to take a series of pictures of celebrities posing in different scenes and roles for a Disney Park‘s campaign, Year of a Million Dreams.
One year later, Entertainment Tonight, a television program, reported that Miley Cyrus at 15 years of age posed half nude for a Vanity Fair photoshoot that was conducted by Annie Leibovitz.
The spokesperson from Disney described the situation as an approach to sell the magazines. Towards the photo, many parents were outraged and soon both Cyrus and Leibovitz made apologetic statements.