Annie L. does Beto O.

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Seems to me the photos do their job well. Good intro for Beto, with almost a Rockwellian homage ... family, warm tones, casual, America. The dog! The open road, a little of that Kerouac influence Beto is playing with.

Manipulative? Why not? It’s politics. Haven’t read the article yet. It was the pictures I was more interested in for the moment.

Are these photos remarkable/extraordinary? No. I don’t think they’re trying to be. The first and particularly the last are the most iconic. They do seem relatable. Leibovitz seems to portray a distinctively appealing character, politics aside. She seems sympathetic to the persona Beto puts forth. And I mean “sympathetic” in the sense of harmonic resonance. She seems to get him and be able to visually translate the narrative he’s creating.

To me, these are good story-telling photos, good character studies. She’s a celebrity photographer and he’s staked out a celebrity lane. Still, though, relatively understated as that goes. They are commercial. That’s Annie, at the top of her game.

My take is that the photos are cleverly located, framed, shot, post-processed and selected to project (one part of) the O' Rouke 'brand'. I assume it's genuine (I'd never heard of him). Many photos in the series initially gave me the sense of being almost 'amateur snaps' shot on the fly, but of course they're not. The photo's perfectly show a homely, informal, regular guy doing everyday things his family. The Leibovitz style (colors, relatively low contrasts and saturation) is consistent throughout the series and with earlier work. So the photos look low-tech, not too sharp, not too vibrant, not too perfectly framed (a missing foot is fine!), include color casts, etc.

These are very different from photos of O'Rourke speaking at public engagements with a suit and tie on. Homely photo's of him making pancakes in the kitchen also fit 'the story' much better than photos of him mowing one of his 4 lawns with his monumental house in the backgground. ;)

So yes, I think Leibovitz did a great job of portaying 'the man' rather than 'the polititician'.

My take is that the photos are cleverly located, framed, shot, post-processed and selected to project (one part of) the O' Rouke 'brand'. I assume it's genuine (I'd never heard of him). Many photos in the series initially gave me the sense of being almost 'amateur snaps' shot on the fly, but of course they're not. The photo's perfectly show a homely, informal, regular guy doing everyday things his family. The Leibovitz style (colors, relatively low contrasts and saturation) is consistent throughout the series and with earlier work. So the photos look low-tech, not too sharp, not too vibrant, not too perfectly framed (a missing foot is fine!), include color casts, etc.

 

These are very different from photos of O'Rourke speaking at public engagements with a suit and tie on. Homely photo's of him making pancakes in the kitchen also fit 'the story' much better than photos of him mowing one of his 4 lawns with his monumental house in the backgground. ;)

 

So yes, I think Leibovitz did a great job of portaying 'the man' rather than 'the polititician'.

She may have photographed him with the large house behind. But the editor eliminated those and picked the shots to fit the story.

Good point, @AlanKlein! You're right of course. I'm sure Leibovitz submitted many more photos from which the editor (probably in agreement with O'Rourke and/or his campaign manager) selected these ones that fitted the story. I'd forgotten about the editor's role. Thanks for this.

Mike

She may have photographed him with the large house behind. But the editor eliminated those and picked the shots to fit the story.

Manipulative? Why not? It’s politics.

I'm allergic to being told whom to like. I'm serious--it makes me run the other way. Leibovitz does a fantastic job with these photos, I can tell because now I can't stand the guy.