Annie Leibovitz: “I wasn’t one of those people who always wanted to be a photographer”

Anna-Lou “Annie” Leibovitz (October 2, 1949) is one of the most important American photographers. The biography written by The Art Directors Club explains perfectly who Leibovitz is: “Annie Leibovitz’s witty, powerful portraits have been appearing on magazine covers for more than twenty-five years. In that time she has become one of the world’s most celebrated photographers.”

Yoko Ono and John Lennon in Rolling Stones frontpage, January 198 | Photo: Annie Leibovitz.

On why she became a photographer, Leibovitz said in an interview for literalmagazine.com: “I wasn’t one of those people who always wanted to be a photographer and started when they were twelve. For me it came from wanting to do art, which is something I became aware of when I was at the San Francisco Art Institute in the 1960s. There was something wonderful about the whole process—the immediacy of taking pictures, and the license it gave you to go out in the world.”

Photo of Whoopi Goldberg for an article published in Vanity Fair, July 1984 | Photo: Annie Leibovitz.

“I only work with digital now. I love it,” she said in an interview for The St. Petersburg Times written by Chris Gordon. “I never was a technical photographer, although I eventually had to learn to get better. I’m more about content. The biggest problem for me right now with digital is that I love what I see on the screen and I can’t get it to translate onto paper. I think in the long run it’s going to end up on the screen. You’re not going to see it on paper,” explained Leibovitz about the photojournalism and the future of this profession.