He returned his advance and held back the images until he included them in his book An Autobiography in 1992. After nine months of taking pictures with his Rolleiflex, Avedon reconsidered publishing the photographs. Shortly after the Second World War Avedon was commissioned by Life magazine to document street life in New York City. Over the course of his working life Avedon produced several ambitious projects. In this saturated environment what can a photograph tell us? How can we go deeper? How can we make a connection with the subject of a photograph? Photography is ubiquitous and everyone can make photographs. We are right to be suspicious of photographic veracity in an age where the photographic image is constructed, Photoshopped, and where images of the human face and body are idealised. A good one is full of clues.’ Now, in the 21st century we might take photographs at face value. They’re readings of what’s on the surface. In 1970 he wrote this: ‘My photographs don’t go below the surface. What do these photographic portraits reveal to us about the lives of their subjects?Īvedon has emphasised the complicity of his portraits to the effect of reality.
Looking at reproductions in the many books that have been produced on Avedon’s photographic work, one is struck by their clarity, their bold composition, in many there is a sense of motion either in flight or arrested.
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