Welcome to my April 2020 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

So, we are coming full circle, in a way, ending as it began, with someone most everyone will know.  Annie Leibovitz (see what I did there…z…) (1949-) is “a celebrated American photographer best known for her engaging and dramatic celebrity portraits. Adept at capturing her subject’s personality and inner life, her images reflect intimate or staged moments that reveal the playful and expressive aspects of her sitters” (http://www.artnet.com/artists/annie-leibovitz/)

I absolutely love Leibovitz’s photography.  Sometimes intimate, sometimes stark, sometimes playful, sometimes bizarre.  If you don’t know it, I am sure you will find something about it that draws you in.

There are LOTS of resources out there on Annie Leibovitz beyond what I’ve included here, so go off and search for more!

Thanks for coming to visit my A to Z posts this year.  Not as in depth as I was at first anticipating they would be, but I am SO glad I did them and made it through considering what April brought me at work.  And I learned a lot about women in photography I didn’t know before too.

Resources:

Annie Leibovitz at Wikipedia

Annie Leibovitz at ArtNet

Annie Leibovitz on the shots that made her

Annie Leibovitz at Vanity Fair

Annie Leibovitz at Biography.com

Thanks for visiting my 2020 A to Z Challenge – Letter Z.  You can find links to more blogs participating in this challenge at A to Z 2020 Challenge Master List (Google Docs).

Welcome to my April 2020 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

Zaida Ben-Yusuf (1869-1933) was a American photographer.  She was “noted for her artistic portraits of wealthy, fashionable, and famous Americans during the turn of the 19th–20th century. ” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaida_Ben-Yusuf)  “Although Ben-Yusuf’s unusual background and stylish appearance undoubtedly attracted attention in New York, it was her innovative camera work that drew many of the city’s most high-profile residents to her studio: actors, writers, painters, sculptors, politicians and other notables.”  (https://web.archive.org/web/20100724060754/http://www.america.gov/st/arts-english/2008/May/20080429174122GLnesnoM0.9014856.html)

Not a lot out there about her, but please explore the few links I was able to fine.  And, yes, you might have thought I could have used Zaida Ben-Yusuf for “Z”, but no…you will just have to wait until tomorrow to see who pops up there!

Self-portrait of American photographer Zaida Ben-Yusuf

Resources:

Zaida Ben-Yusuf at Wikipedia

Zaida Ben-Yusuf

New Exhibition Resurrects Legacy of Groundbreaking Photographer

Thanks for visiting my 2020 A to Z Challenge – Letter Y.  You can find links to more blogs participating in this challenge at A to Z 2020 Challenge Master List (Google Docs).

Welcome to my April 2020 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

Jessie Tarbox Beals  (1870-1942) was a American photographer (although she was born in Canada), and is known as “the first published female photojournalist in the United States and the first female night photographer.  She is best known for her freelance news photographs, particularly of the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, and portraits of places such as Bohemian Greenwich Village.  Her trademarks were her self-described “ability to hustle” and her tenacity in overcoming gender barriers in her profession.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessie_Tarbox_Beals)

Yes, this is where I fudge it – but there is an “X” there!   Being a photojournalist, and a woman, in the early 1900s had to have been very challenging.  “Photojournalism was physically demanding, often risky work, but Beals could be seen carrying out assignments in her ankle-length dresses and large hats, with her 8-by-10-inch glass plate camera and 50 pounds of equipment in tow.”  (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessie_Tarbox_Beals)  Now, here are a couple of images from this trailblazer, in the public domain.

Jessie Tarbox Beals

Olympic Marathon participants, Len Tau (left) and Jan Mashiani of the Tswana tribe of South Africa

Resources:

Jessie Tarbox Beals at Wikipedia

Jessie Tarbox Beals at the Library of Congress

Jessie Tarbox Beals at Britannica

Jessie Tarbox Beals at the Howard Greenberg Gallery

Jessie Tarbox Beals at the New York Historical Society Museum and Library

Thanks for visiting my 2020 A to Z Challenge – Letter X.  You can find links to more blogs participating in this challenge at A to Z 2020 Challenge Master List (Google Docs).