Photography for the Mind

A week or so ago a friend of mine invited me to attend a special exhibit at the art museum downtown.  My friend, Steph, is a photographer and she asked if I wanted to come with her to see some photography by the one and only Annie Leibovitz.  I have admired Leibovitz's work for a while but I was most, if not entirely, familiar with her portrait work.  Her photographs have graced the covers of Vanity Fair and Vogue (among others) and I know she is sought after by not only celebrities but also Presidents, Prime Ministers, and the like.  She is one talented lady that always manages to capture an instant that is unlike any other...this exhibit was no different.  I knew this show was not focused on portraits but instead on time and place and influence.  I absolutely loved it! 

I am not a photographer.  I know nothing about light, filters, exposure times - which is why going with Steph was so perfect.  She has a trained eye.  I do not.  It was the perfect combination.  When she sees a photograph she sees technique, equipment, science, art.  When I see a photograph I see, time, emotion, the unknown, art.  I really was blown away.

The premise of the exhibit - FOR ME- was that Annie chose influential subjects.  Influential to not only her but I would say to a good cross section of the American public.  It ranged from presidents (Lincoln), to science minds (Thoreau and Emerson), to the arts (Elvis, Ansel Adams, and Emily Dickinson).  In each case Leibovitz visited a place that honors these people.  For example, Monticello and Thomas Jefferson, Graceland and Elvis, Yosemite and Ansel Adams.  She went to places that have been captured on film a hundred times over.  Places that anyone can go visit (the Lincoln memorial, Thoreau's cabin).  But despite these locations being open to the public and the subjects having been seen by thousands of eyes there was just something different, something more to the photos she captured.  I was educated, I was awed, I was moved.  I think, for me, the most striking were the images that related to influences on me...Darwin, Thoreau, Emerson, Eleanor Roosevelt.  I spent more time staring and processing these photos.  I have read so much about these great minds and my grandmother would always tell me about how Eleanor Roosevelt was so much more than just a First Lady.  I have spent many hours in our living room recliner reading Thoreau and Emerson.  These people speak to me and seeing the photographs of what mattered to them, what their spaces looked like, where they felt they belonged...it all had an impact on me.  I know these people are real, that they had lives beyond the pages I have read but to see it, to really see it...wow!  There must be a better word or words but...wow.  I am thankful that I was able to go and I am thankful that my mind is open to evolution.  I feel even more connected to these people that were before my time yet I understand.