Anne Brigman

Invictus

Storm Tree

The Dying Cedar



The Work of Anne Brigman puts me at a loss of words. Her pictures are absolutely captivating, intriguing and outstandingly beautiful! Her photos tell a story, one that you can interpret in your own creative way. I love how her photos are both abstract, mysterious, and beautiful all wrapped into one. I am so glad that I have been introduced to her marvelously inspiring and moving work. I think she has officially become my favorite photographer!

The subjects Anne used in her pictures are best described in words that are not my own, so i will quotes the sayings from the J. Paul Getty Museum website, " They were Slim, hearty, unaffected women of early maturity living a hardy out-of-doors life in high boots and jeans toughened to the wind and sun." For the most part she liked to shoot them nude, or partially nude. The magnificent scenery in her pictures come from the Sierra Nevada Mountains, where she preferred to do her photography. She eventually moved to Long Beach South California, she she continued photographing, and changed her focus to sand erosions. The subjects in her pictures appear to be at one with nature, or part of nature its self, this I believe is what is so captivating about her work. To get the mysterious, and different look she wanted in her pictures, paint and tools were used to alter her negatives. She even went to the extreme to take parts of the image out or to add images in, like trees, or the moon. She published a book of poems along with some of her photograph shortly before she died, the book it titled "Songs of a Pagan". The great thing about Anne is that there is not much history of her early life before photography. All we know is that she began as a painter, later switching her interests to photography. This makes her a mysterious as her pictures. Her work was published in Camera Works, the publisher owned an art gallery and display her work there as well. I would like to end with a quote form Anne herself "My pictures tell of my freedom of soul, of my emancipation from fear." Anne was a true feminist and believed that women were scared to come into her own, her images were her inspiration to women.