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Peter LindberghFashion photographer
Date of Birth: 23.11.1944
Country:  Germany |
Content:
Biography of Peter Lindbergh
Fashion photographer Peter Lindbergh was one of the most prominent fashion photographers in the world. He is credited with creating the phenomenon of supermodels in the 1990s.
Early Life and Education
Peter Lindbergh was born in 1944 in the Polish city of Leszno. He was the third child in his family and they soon moved to Duisburg, the center of Germany's metallurgical industry. At the age of 14, he dropped out of school and began working as a window dresser in a local department store. At the age of 18, Lindbergh moved to Switzerland to avoid military service, and then returned to Berlin. He enrolled in the Academy of Arts, but soon decided to follow in the footsteps of Vincent van Gogh and went to Arles. In the mornings, Peter worked on a farm, and in the evenings, he painted and sold his works in markets. Later, as a true beatnik, he hitchhiked across Europe and North Africa, but eventually returned to Germany. "I was about 20. I was lost to society: I smoked marijuana, slept on the streets. Two years on the road is a long time. There was a lot of time for reflection. It made me a different person," Lindbergh recalls those times. He came to photography completely by chance. His brother's children brought him so much joy that Peter wanted to photograph them. He used his first camera to capture his nephews.
Photography Career
In 1971, Lindbergh found a job as a photographer's assistant, and in 1973, he opened his own studio in Dusseldorf. His first advertising campaign was for VW Golf, and his first fashion shoot was for the prestigious magazine Stern. In 1978, he moved to Paris and started publishing in Harper's Bazaar, Vogue, Vanity Fair, and Rolling Stone. Although he mainly shoots advertising and editorial photographs, Lindbergh uses clothing as a prop rather than the central element of the shoot. It is believed that Peter Lindbergh was the first to introduce a new form of realism in photography, reevaluating beauty standards under the influence of documentary photographers and photojournalists such as Dorothea Lange, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Garry Winogrand. He stands out from his colleagues with a humanistic approach and a unique vision of women, highlighting their spirituality and individuality.
Legacy
Lindbergh drastically changed the standards of fashion photography during a time when excessive retouching was prevalent. He firmly believed that there is something else that makes a person interesting, regardless of their age. In an interview, he stated, "Contemporary photographers should liberate women and, finally, everyone from the terror of youth and perfection." In a conversation with a journalist in May 2016, Lindbergh declared, "A fashion photographer must contribute to defining the image of contemporary women or men in their time, to reflect a certain social or human reality."
Following his principles, Peter Lindbergh photographed supermodels and celebrities with minimal makeup and no hairstyling. He saw power and poetry in imperfection. The faces of his models appear untouched by cosmetics or any other artificiality. Perhaps that is why his portraits are not subject to the influence of time or fashion. Peter Lindbergh passed away on September 3, 2019.
