Peter Lindbergh
The magical power of his lens—a portfolio
The photographer Peter Lindbergh had a unique magic. He had magic with light, magic with places and a surreal ability to put a spell on his subjects to get them to show their real face. He persuaded actors, models and musicians to reveal their true identities to his lens.
His work changed Fashion and the way we see celebrity forever. Many years ago Peter Lindbergh, who was working for Alexander Liberman, the Editorial Director of Vogue, when Lindbergh told Liberman he wanted to change things up. In 1988, Lindbergh turned in all black-and-white shots of 6 models in a group wearing nothing more than large men’s white shirts and a new humanity, a realness to their faces. The images went unused and placed in a drawer. Anna Wintour took over shortly thereafter from Vogue Editor Grace Mirabella and discovered the rejects from Lindbergh’s shoot and loved them so much she made one a cover of the magazine.
Since then he has since been worshipped by the fashion industry for his very personal black and white photos that have graced every major fashion magazine. Lindbergh said, “I look at women for who they really are, perhaps this is what leads me to trust them.” He photographed Kate Moss many, many times simply gazing into Peter’s lens as if no one else were there, just Peter and Kate.
He was always on the look out new locations that were in themselves disruptive of the fashion norm. He liked the wrong side of the tracks and was looking for the industrial or the rougher side of town. It all worked and his narrative mix of all these components touched us in a way no other photographer could.
We put together a portfolio of some of his voluminous work from his IG. We are devoutly appreciative of Peter Lindbergh and hope you will get turned on or revisit some of his stunning, magical photography.
