Diane Arbus

[connealy]

I thought the <a

href="http://nytimes.com/pages/magazine/index.html?8dpc">NY Times

Magazine article</a> on Diane Arbus was a good read. She did quite a

bit of what would today be described as stealth photography, but most

of her pictures were what she referred to as "trophies" of intense

engagement with her subjects. Interestingly, many of her subjects did

not like the pictures made of them, and critics often leveled an

accusation against her of exploitation of the vulnerable. I think the

moral of the story is that you have to be prepared for indignant

criticism of your pictures of people regardless of the technique you

use to get the pictures.

[leslie_cheung]

i haven't read the nyt article but read her biography. i believe she

used a big flash with her often big cameras. i wouldn't call it

stealth given that she use fill flash almost exclusively though she

did use leicas early on in her career. she dugout the weird "mutants"

and took their photos. as far as exploitation of the vulnerable? i

have mixed feeling. also i think her photos are overated though they

are great photos and portraits of weirdo after weirdo get dull fast.

i admit i like her life story more than her photos.

[ward]

Leslie (and Mike),

 

I just read the whole article and all the add-on sections as well; it re-frames that whole "mutant" discussion in a new light. I have always deeply loved Arbus and Lizette Model, who is also mentioned, and it was a pretty emotional experience for me to read this. Mike, thanks for posting the link. I would have missed it.

 

--w

[Spearhead]

The biography wasn't particularly good. It was written by someone who knew nothing about photography and photographers. To comment like that without reading the referenced article seems off-base. Read the article and then come back and comment.

[leslie_cheung]

i thought the biography was good. it was a good read though i don't

know about the accuracy of it but who really does? the book wasn't a

critique of arbus's photos but simply told a version of arbus's life

story. the NYT article was a good read too but it didn't add any more

significant insight.

 

why don't you think the book was particularly good jeff?

[Spearhead]

The problems with the biography have been discussed for years. A good review of the issues can be found <a href="http://elsa.photo.net/arbus2.htm">here.</a>

[andrew_lee2]

Enjoyed the article and the accompanying slide show VERY much Mike, thanks for the link. Newfound appreciation for Arbus, whose work has previously never really been my 'thing'.

[todd frederick]

Diane Arbus is an interesting photographer, who worked with her husband in many photographic projects.

 

She had many emotionial issues to deal with and eventually killed herself....slit wrists in a bathtub!.

 

Her daughter is a photographer who has worked with Richard Avendon.

 

Read the biography...avalaible through most public libraries. During the years when she did much of her photography with the mentally retarded and other unusual people and outcasts, she used a Mamiya TLR with a side flash...very basic.

 

A few years ago a vintage square contact print of "Twins" sold on auction for about $50,000!

 

About 10 years ago I sold a first edition of the "Diane Arbus" book for about $10 at a photo fair...stupid me!. I think it now sells for about $1,500! Oh well! (^O^)

[george_sanderson]

Mike - thanks for posting the site. An excellent read.

[todd frederick]

There is a good article on Diane Arbus in the Sept/Oct issue of American Photo with many classic photos.

[elsa_dorfman]

I liked the article a lot. like the detail, forgive me, that she slit her wrists in the bathtub DRESSED. I always had a marat sade image of a naked body in my mind. And the detail that, shades of ted hughes and sylvia plath, the last two pages of her diary had been neatly cut away and apparently destroyed. by whom???? And I had no idea Doon, her daughter, was 26 when Diane died. I had thought younger and had a different scenario in my head. And I think it is a reason to rejoice that her estate has FINALLY after thirty years opened up her archive. As the article reported, the Arbus Trust wdn't let anyone reprint her work w/o approving the accompanying text, wdn't let scholars see any unpublished material. I think the new book and show will be amazing.

[douglas k.]

The Arbus biography was by Patricia Bosworth and was wretched. The author couldn't even get the correct name for Arbus' camera (I think she called it a "Miniaflex" or something like that). Granted, knowing the correct name of the camera is not crucial to understanding Arbus' work, but getting that wrong -- when it's such a simple matter to get it right -- indicates the general sloppiness of the book, and is emblematic of the even larger problems the auther had in understanding Arbus' life and work. The NYT Sunday Magazine article, in a fraction of the space, displayed much better understanding of Arbus' motives and her photos, at least from what I can tell.

[albert_stiegman]

Time changes things and what was striking and new starts to get familiar. I

went to the 1972 Arbus show at MOMA and, believe me, at the time there was

little as interesting and different being done in photography. The vocabulary

of the medium changed preceptibly with that show (as it had with the

publication of The Americans). Her pictures are so familiar now and images

have moved well past the point she defined but, possibly due to my memory

of that show, I still find them haunting and surreal.

 

As to the Bosworth biography, it was poor and poorly edited (Allan Arbus was

spelled both Allen and Allan). However, how much of this was due to

Bosworth's poor scholarship and how much to the fact that Doon Arbus would

not share material about her mother (as mentioned in the Times article) is

unclear. It does seen like a reappraisal of her career is in order.