The great portrait photographer tells the stories behind her best shots

At Work

by Annie Leibovitz

Random House

2008, 240 pages, 9 x 9 x 3

$29 Buy a copy on Amazon

I knew Annie Leibovitz was a phenomenal photographer. But I didn’t know she was a terrific storyteller, too. In At Work, she reveals the behind-the-scenes stories of her most famous photos: John and Yoko’s nude photo session (taken just a few hours before he was assassinated), Whoopi Goldberg lying in a tub of milk, Keith Haring in body paint, a shirtless Arnold Schwarzenegger mounted on a horse, a naked and very pregnant Demi Moore, and a very formal portrait of Queen Elizabeth.

John and Yoko were exchanging a kiss on the cover of the new album. It was a simple kiss in a jaded time. I thought about how people curl up together in bed, and I asked them to pose nude in an embrace. They had never been embarrassed about taking their clothes off. There was frontal nudity on the cover of Two Virgins, the first record they did together. They were artists, John had no problem with my idea, but Yoko said she didn’t want to take her pants off for some reason. So I said,“Oh, Leave everything on.” I made a Polaroid of them lying together and John looked at it and said,“You’ve captured our relationship exactly.” He had just spent five years being what he referred to as a house husband, taking care of their young son, Sean, and the new album was his return to a musical career. He took me aside and said that he knew that the magazine wanted just a picture of him on the cover but that he wanted Yoko on the cover too. He said it was really important.

The end of the book has clear practical information about the equipment she uses and answers to the ten most frequent questions she’s asked.

8. When do you know you have a good picture? When I was young, I never knew when to stop. I could never tell what I had. I was afraid I was going to miss something if I left. I remember working with the writer David Felton on a story about the Beach Boys and being surprised that at a certain point he just walked away. He said he had enough material, which seemed incomprehensible to me. What did he mean he had enough? How could he even think like that? I thought that if you kept doing it, it would get better and better. As I became more experienced, I began to understand that someone who is being photographed can work for only so long and that you shouldn’t belabor the situation. Something is either going to happen or it’s not going to happen. It’s not going to suddenly turn into something else. Or very rarely. What does happen a lot is that as soon as you say it’s over the subject will feel relieved and suddenly look great. And then you keep shooting. There are times when I just can’t get what I want. I sometimes think I get maybe 10% of what I see. I can be very frustrated, for instance, by natural light. Sometimes the light on someone looks incredibly beautiful but it just won’t translate into the photograph. It won’t look the same. Photography is limited. It’s an illusion of what’s going on. Basically, you’re never totally satisfied.

— Mark Frauenfelder