Lois Greenfield
Lois Greenfield is an American photographer who specializes in dancers. Greenfield was born on April 18, 1949 and is now 72 years old. She attended Brandeis University and was studying to become an ethnographic filmmaker, but instead became a photojournalist for a local newspaper. She traveled around the world as a photojournalist, but then she came across an assignment to photograph a dance dress rehearsal in the 1970s. She fell in love and has been photographing dancers ever since.
In 1982 she created her own studio to take pictures in so she could have full control of her photos and subjects, for example she could adjust the lighting to as she would like. Greenfield’s photos usually consist of a single dancer who is doing some sort of jump or movement in the air with a flowing piece of fabric either on them like a dress or skirt, or around them like a scarf or blanket. The background is usually white, however there are some exceptions. Some of my favorites of her pieces have multiple dancers connecting, but not connecting at the same time. Either way the dancers look weightless and suspended in the air without gravity to pull them down.
Greenfield’s goal was to capture the expressive potential for movement through her photos. "What intrigues me is making images that confound and confuse the viewer, but that the viewer knows, or suspects, really happened [...] I can't depict the moments before or after the camera's click, but I invite the viewer's consideration of that question." Greenfield’s books like Breaking Bounds and Moving Still go more in depth about her philosophy of trying to capture movement through a still photo. Greenfield says, “I am dealing in the poetics of a visual language rather than in its literalness. I want my images to defy rational explanation.”
Greenfield has influenced me and the photos I take by showing that the person you take pictures of doesn’t have to be still in a pose for it to look good. I also learned from examining her work that flowing fabrics and other things like that in the air create movement from the eye. Not only is the picture showing movement but the person who is looking at it is also showing movement. Because of her I have started taking pictures for my dance friends with them dancing however they would like and then taking photos in the moment to capture the movement. Sometimes they’ll wear flowy skirts to show even more movement. She has inspired me a lot.
In 1982 she created her own studio to take pictures in so she could have full control of her photos and subjects, for example she could adjust the lighting to as she would like. Greenfield’s photos usually consist of a single dancer who is doing some sort of jump or movement in the air with a flowing piece of fabric either on them like a dress or skirt, or around them like a scarf or blanket. The background is usually white, however there are some exceptions. Some of my favorites of her pieces have multiple dancers connecting, but not connecting at the same time. Either way the dancers look weightless and suspended in the air without gravity to pull them down.
Greenfield’s goal was to capture the expressive potential for movement through her photos. "What intrigues me is making images that confound and confuse the viewer, but that the viewer knows, or suspects, really happened [...] I can't depict the moments before or after the camera's click, but I invite the viewer's consideration of that question." Greenfield’s books like Breaking Bounds and Moving Still go more in depth about her philosophy of trying to capture movement through a still photo. Greenfield says, “I am dealing in the poetics of a visual language rather than in its literalness. I want my images to defy rational explanation.”
Greenfield has influenced me and the photos I take by showing that the person you take pictures of doesn’t have to be still in a pose for it to look good. I also learned from examining her work that flowing fabrics and other things like that in the air create movement from the eye. Not only is the picture showing movement but the person who is looking at it is also showing movement. Because of her I have started taking pictures for my dance friends with them dancing however they would like and then taking photos in the moment to capture the movement. Sometimes they’ll wear flowy skirts to show even more movement. She has inspired me a lot.
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Untitled Untitled |
This image is my favorite that I took from this collection. I think the pose is pretty spot on. The colors of the costume aren't the same, and the tutu is a regular tutu in mine and a pancake tutu in Greenfield's but other than that I think this picture looks very similar. This picture probably has the most differences of the three. The costume isn't very similar and my picture doesn't have the scarf behind her. I didn't have anything to use as the scarf so I tried to recreate the flowing movement through my friends skirt. The subject in Greenfield's photo is on pointe and mine is not. I still think these pictures are pretty similar, though. The costumes in these photos are very similar, but Greenfield's has a fan or some way to make the subject's skirt flowy. I think the pose is pretty similar, but there are still a couple small differences like the height of the leg or the angles of the arms. However I think this is still very similar. |
Black Swan
Arabesque Attitude |
Artist's Statement
These pictures were very hard to take. I had to wait until my friends were able to come over to take these which took longer than expected. It's a lot harder than you'd think to try to get these to not be blurry. I'm a perfectionist, so I made my friends do this over and over again until I got what I wanted, (sorry friends!) I'm not as happy as I could be with how these turned out, but I'm definitely not disappointed. I think these are great nonetheless. I think the poses were recreated well and even though this was a struggle for me and my friends trying to get it just perfect we had a lot of fun and memories were made.
Sources:
https://www.loisgreenfield.com/about-lois-greenfield
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CEcbid64q0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjtrZrNYVeQ&t=21s
https://www.loisgreenfield.com/
https://www.loisgreenfield.com/about-lois-greenfield
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CEcbid64q0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjtrZrNYVeQ&t=21s
https://www.loisgreenfield.com/