Jan R Reineke: annie leibovitz in berlin

Final Exam

Subject: Transposition

Transposition is a term, originally used in relation to music that describes the act of moving a tone or tone sequence up or down by a constant number of semitones.
I want to adapt this term to stories or ideas and put these into a different context. To achieve this I have made "modern" versions of old stories and fairy tales by using different techniques of animation.

Another part of my final exam is the "BATTLEBLOG". On this blog, six fellow students and me make short animation movies that react on each other. There is a limit of 25 seconds per animation, and 72 hours to make it. Further explanations on the blog itself.

Tuesday, 31 March 2009

annie leibovitz in berlin

in berlin, nils and i visited the exhibition "a photogrpher's life" from annie leibovitz. the exhibition was highly recommended, and she is often called one of the best photographers of our time. after seeing her work, i considered her THE photographer of our time. maybe a bit exaggarating, but i think she is at least in the sector portait/people.
the exhibition itself was located in a beautiful old post office, a nice place, espacially for displaying art.
annie leibovitz' pictures, reached from panoramic landscapes to close ups, but most of them were portraits. many works were exposed she had produced in the 30 or more years she worked for different magazines, like the rolling stone, vogue or vanity fair. for them she had the chance to photograph many famous people all over the world and make a name. what i like about her portraits is, that they are simple, but powerful. she often uses simple, personal surroundings, and natural light. she doesn't use the studio so often, or stages her pictures, she says it would feel wrong, or fake then. using so simple means, she still manages to capture the character of the person she photographs, or pic out a special side or aspect of him or her.
she also exposed many personal pictures of family and friends, that are even more moving on an emotional level. for example she photographed a series of her dying companion in life, susan sontag. the pictures are really touching, and of great emotional power.

this is the only picture i took inside, photographing was not allowed (and i photographed anyways, shame on me).
when nils and i left the building, we were pretty surprised. the street in front of us was full of people (this time it was not the line for the exhibition, we had waited 45min in, earlier). it was a big political demonstartion of "die linke" (socialistic party in germany), with some extreme liberalists inbetween, against capitalism and for communism. i don't like communism, if we had planed economy, i would be rid of job ;)
anyways, still induced by the exhibition, i took the chance to take some documentary pictures.