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Contemporary Portrait Photography

CONTEMPORARY STYLE

Used to refer to a time rather than an aesthetic, Contemporary art generally describes pieces created after 1970 or being made by living artists anywhere in the world. This immediacy means it encompasses art responding to the present moment through diverse subjects, media and themes. Contemporary painting, sculpture, photography, performance, digital art, video and more frequently includes work that is attempting to reshape current ideas about what art can be, from Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s use of candy to memorialize a lover he lost to AIDS-related complications to Jenny Holzer’s ongoing “Truisms,” a Conceptual series that sees provocative messages printed on billboards, T-shirts, benches and other public places that exist outside of formal exhibitions and the conventional “white cube” of galleries.

Contemporary art has been pushing the boundaries of creative expression for years. Its disruption of the traditional concepts of art are often aiming to engage viewers in complex questions about identity, society and culture. In the latter part of the 20th century, contemporary movements included Land art, in which artists like Robert Smithson and Michael Heizer create large-scale, site-specific sculptures, installations and other works in soil and bodies of water; Sound art, with artists such as Christian Marclay and Susan Philipsz centering art on sonic experiences; and New Media art, in which mass media and digital culture inform the work of artists such as Nam June Paik and Rafaël Rozendaal.

The first decades of the 21st century have seen the growth of Contemporary African art, the revival of figurative painting, the emergence of street art and the rise of NFTs, unique digital artworks that are powered by blockchain technology.

Major Contemporary artists practicing now include Ai Weiwei, Cecily Brown, David Hockney, Yayoi Kusama, Jeff Koons, Takashi Murakami and Kara Walker.

Find a collection of Contemporary prints, photography, paintings, sculptures and other art on 1stDibs.

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Style: Contemporary
Equestrian Beauty #3
Located in New York City, NY
Large-scale photograph from the Equine Beauty series. The legendary and complex relationship between humans and horses is an enduring one. The horse’s distinctive blend of grace and...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Pigment

Milky Way - Tim Flach, Dogs, Animal Photography, Contemporary British Art
Located in Brighton, GB
Please bear in mind that all prints are produced to order. Lead times between 15-20 days. Edition 6/10 All items are shipped as a print only and come unframed. Tim Flach is a grad...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print, Photographic Paper, Color

Utilita II, Wellington, United States, Horse Portrait, Equine Beauty
Located in New York City, NY
Large-scale photograph from the Equine Beauty series. The legendary and complex relationship between humans and horses is an enduring one. The horse’s distinctive blend of grace and...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Pigment

Marilyn Monroe Posed on Car
Located in Austin, TX
Circa 1945 in Los Angeles, California: Before she was the famous Marilyn Monroe, was known as Norma Jeane Dougherty, seen here siting on a sports car in Hollywood. Marilyn Monroe wa...
Category

1940s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Reflection (Suburbia) - Contemporary, Polaroid, Photography
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Reflection (Suburbia) - 2004 20x20cm, Edition of 10, Archival C-Print based on a Polaroid, Not mounted, Certificate and signature label. Artist Inventory No. 2765. This project...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Raquel Welch 1966 LIFETIME silver gelatin b/w photograph
Located in Norwich, GB
Terry O’Neill CBE is one of the world’s most collected photographers, with work hanging in national art galleries and private collections worldwide. From presidents to pop stars, he ...
Category

Late 20th Century Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin

My own private Travel Diary - Bishop, CA - Autumn
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
My own private Travel Diary - Bishop, CA - Autumn - 2001, 20x29cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival C-Print, based on a Polaroid Slide. Signature label and Certificate. Not mounted. LIFE’S A DREAM (The Personal World of Stefanie Schneider) by Mark Gisbourne Projection is a form of apparition that is characteristic of our human nature, for what we imagine almost invariably transcends the reality of what we live. And, an apparition, as the word suggests, is quite literally ‘an appearing’, for what we appear to imagine is largely shaped by the imagination of its appearance. If this sounds tautological then so be it. But the work of Stefanie Schneider is almost invariably about chance and apparition. And, it is through the means of photography, the most apparitional of image-based media, that her pictorial narratives or photo-novels are generated. Indeed, traditional photography (as distinct from new digital technology) is literally an ‘awaiting’ for an appearance to take place, in line with the imagined image as executed in the camera and later developed in the dark room. The fact that Schneider uses out-of-date Polaroid film stock to take her pictures only intensifies the sense of their apparitional contents when they are realised. The stability comes only at such time when the images are re-shot and developed in the studio, and thereby fixed or arrested temporarily in space and time. The unpredictable and at times unstable film she adopts for her works also creates a sense of chance within the outcome that can be imagined or potentially envisaged by the artist Schneider. But this chance manifestation is a loosely controlled, or, better called existential sense of chance, which becomes pre-disposed by the immediate circumstances of her life and the project she is undertaking at the time. Hence the choices she makes are largely open-ended choices, driven by a personal nature and disposition allowing for a second appearing of things whose eventual outcome remains undefined. And, it is the alliance of the chance-directed material apparition of Polaroid film, in turn explicitly allied to the experiences of her personal life circumstances, that provokes the potential to create Stefanie Schneider’s open-ended narratives. Therefore they are stories based on a degenerate set of conditions that are both material and human, with an inherent pessimism and a feeling for the sense of sublime ridicule being seemingly exposed. This in turn echoes and doubles the meaning of the verb ‘to expose’. To expose being embedded in the technical photographic process, just as much as it is in the narrative contents of Schneider’s photo-novel exposés. The former being the unstable point of departure, and the latter being the uncertain ends or meanings that are generated through the photographs doubled exposure. The large number of speculative theories of apparition, literally read as that which appears, and/or creative visions in filmmaking and photography are self-evident, and need not detain us here. But from the earliest inception of photography artists have been concerned with manipulated and/or chance effects, be they directed towards deceiving the viewer, or the alchemical investigations pursued by someone like Sigmar Polke. None of these are the real concern of the artist-photographer Stefanie Schneider, however, but rather she is more interested with what the chance-directed appearances in her photographs portend. For Schneider’s works are concerned with the opaque and porous contents of human relations and events, the material means are largely the mechanism to achieving and exposing the ‘ridiculous sublime’ that has come increasingly to dominate the contemporary affect(s) of our world. The uncertain conditions of today’s struggles as people attempt to relate to each other - and to themselves - are made manifest throughout her work. And, that she does this against the backdrop of the so-called ‘American Dream’, of a purportedly advanced culture that is Modern America, makes them all the more incisive and critical as acts of photographic exposure. From her earliest works of the late nineties one might be inclined to see her photographs as if they were a concerted attempt at an investigative or analytic serialisation, or, better still, a psychoanalytic dissection of the different and particular genres of American subculture. But this is to miss the point for the series though they have dates and subsequent publications remain in a certain sense unfinished. Schneider’s work has little or nothing to do with reportage as such, but with recording human culture in a state of fragmentation and slippage. And, if a photographer like Diane Arbus dealt specifically with the anomalous and peculiar that made up American suburban life, the work of Schneider touches upon the alienation of the commonplace. That is to say how the banal stereotypes of Western Americana have been emptied out, and claims as to any inherent meaning they formerly possessed has become strangely displaced. Her photographs constantly fathom the familiar, often closely connected to traditional American film genre, and make it completely unfamiliar. Of course Freud would have called this simply the unheimlich or uncanny. But here again Schneider almost never plays the role of the psychologist, or, for that matter, seeks to impart any specific meanings to the photographic contents of her images. The works possess an edited behavioural narrative (she has made choices), but there is never a sense of there being a clearly defined story. Indeed, the uncertainty of my reading here presented, acts as a caveat to the very condition that Schneider’s photographs provoke. Invariably the settings of her pictorial narratives are the South West of the United States, most often the desert and its periphery in Southern California. The desert is a not easily identifiable space, with the suburban boundaries where habitation meets the desert even more so. There are certain sub-themes common to Schneider’s work, not least that of journeying, on the road, a feeling of wandering and itinerancy, or simply aimlessness. Alongside this subsidiary structural characters continually appear, the gas station, the automobile, the motel, the highway, the revolver, logos and signage, the wasteland, the isolated train track and the trailer. If these form a loosely defined structure into which human characters and events are cast, then Schneider always remains the fulcrum and mechanism of their exposure. Sometimes using actresses, friends, her sister, colleagues or lovers, Schneider stands by to watch the chance events as they unfold. And, this is even the case when she is a participant in front of camera of her photo-novels. It is the ability to wait and throw things open to chance and to unpredictable circumstances, that marks the development of her work over the last eight years. It is the means by which random occurrences take on such a telling sense of pregnancy in her work. However, in terms of analogy the closest proximity to Schneider’s photographic work is that of film. For many of her titles derive directly from film, in photographic series like OK Corral (1999), Vegas (1999), Westworld (1999), Memorial Day (2001), Primary Colours (2001), Suburbia (2004), The Last Picture Show (2005), and in other examples. Her works also include particular images that are titled Zabriskie Point, a photograph of her sister in an orange wig. Indeed the tentative title for the present publication Stranger Than Paradise is taken from Jim Jarmusch’s film of the same title in 1984. Yet it would be dangerous to take this comparison too far, since her series 29 Palms (1999) presages the later title of a film that appeared only in 2002. What I am trying to say here is that film forms the nexus of American culture, and it is not so much that Schneider’s photographs make specific references to these films (though in some instances they do), but that in referencing them she accesses the same American culture that is being emptied out and scrutinised by her photo-novels. In short her pictorial narratives might be said to strip films of the stereotypical Hollywood tropes that many of them possess. Indeed, the films that have most inspired her are those that similarly deconstruct the same sentimental and increasingly tawdry ‘American Dream’ peddled by Hollywood. These include films like David Lynch’s Blue Velvet (1986), Wild at Heart (1990) The Lost Highway (1997), John Dahl’s The Last Seduction (1994) or films like Ridley Scott’s Thelma and Louise with all its girl-power Bonny and Clyde-type clichés. But they serve no more than as a backdrop, a type of generic tableau from which Schneider might take human and abstracted elements, for as commercial films they are not the product of mere chance and random occurrence. Notwithstanding this observation, it is also clear that the gender deconstructions that the characters in these films so often portray, namely the active role of women possessed of a free and autonomous sexuality (even victim turned vamp), frequently find resonances within the behavioural events taking place in Schneider’s photographs and DVD sequences; the same sense of sexual autonomy that Stefanie Schneider possesses and is personally committed to. In the series 29 Palms (first begun in 1999) the two women characters Radha and Max act out a scenario that is both infantile and adolescent. Wearing brightly coloured fake wigs of yellow and orange, a parody of the blonde and the redhead, they are seemingly trailer park white trash possessing a sentimental and kitsch taste in clothes totally inappropriate to the locality. The fact that Schneider makes no judgment about this is an interesting adjunct. Indeed, the photographic projection of the images is such that the girls incline themselves to believe that they are both beautiful and desirous. However, unlike the predatory role of women in say Richard Prince’s photographs, which are simply a projection of a male fantasy onto women, Radha and Max are self-contained in their vacuous if empty trailer and motel world of the swimming pool, nail polish, and childish water pistols. Within the photographic sequence Schneider includes herself, and acts as a punctum of disruption. Why is she standing in front of an Officers’ Wives Club? Why is Schneider not similarly attired? Is there a proximity to an army camp, are these would-be Lolita(s) Rahda and Max wives or American marine groupies, and where is the centre and focus of their identity? It is the ambiguity of personal involvement that is set up by Schneider which deliberately makes problematic any clear sense of narrative construction. The strangely virulent colours of the bleached-out girls stand in marked contrast to Schneider’s own anodyne sense of self-image. Is she identifying with the contents or directing the scenario? With this series, perhaps, more than any other, Schneider creates a feeling of a world that has some degree of symbolic order. For example the girls stand or squat by a dirt road, posing the question as to their sexual and personal status. Following the 29 Palms series, Schneider will trust herself increasingly by diminishing the sense of a staged environment. The events to come will tell you both everything and nothing, reveal and obfuscate, point towards and simultaneously away from any clearly definable meaning. If for example we compare 29 Palms to say Hitchhiker (2005), and where the sexual contents are made overtly explicit, we do not find the same sense of simulated identity. It is the itinerant coming together of two characters Daisy and Austen, who meet on the road and subsequently share a trailer together. Presented in a sequential DVD and still format, we become party to a would-be relationship of sorts. No information is given as to the background or social origins, or even any reasons as to why these two women should be attracted to each other. Is it acted out? Are they real life experiences? They are women who are sexually free in expressing themselves. But while the initial engagement with the subject is orchestrated by Schneider, and the edited outcome determined by the artist, beyond that we have little information with which to construct a story. The events are commonplace, edgy and uncertain, but the viewer is left to decide as to what they might mean as a narrative. The disaggregated emotions of the work are made evident, the game or role playing, the transitory fantasies palpable, and yet at the same time everything is insubstantial and might fall apart at any moment. The characters relate but they do not present a relationship in any meaningful sense. Or, if they do, it is one driven the coincidental juxtaposition of random emotions. Should there be an intended syntax it is one that has been stripped of the power to grammatically structure what is being experienced. And, this seems to be the central point of the work, the emptying out not only of a particular American way of life, but the suggestion that the grounds upon which it was once predicated are no longer possible. The photo-novel Hitchhiker is porous and the culture of the seventies which it might be said to homage is no longer sustainable. Not without coincidence, perhaps, the decade that was the last ubiquitous age of Polaroid film. In the numerous photographic series, some twenty or so, that occur between 29 Palms and Hitchhiker, Schneider has immersed herself and scrutinised many aspects of suburban, peripheral, and scrubland America. Her characters, including herself, are never at the centre of cultural affairs. Such eccentricities as they might possess are all derived from what could be called their adjacent status to the dominant culture of America. In fact her works are often sated with references to the sentimental sub-strata that underpin so much of American daily life. It is the same whether it is flower gardens and household accoutrements of her photo-series Suburbia (2004), or the transitional and environmental conditions depicted in The Last Picture Show (2005). The artist’s use of sentimental song titles, often adapted to accompany individual images within a series by Schneider, show her awareness of America’s close relationship between popular film and music. For example the song ‘Leaving on a Jet Plane’, becomes Leaving in a Jet Plane as part of The Last Picture Show series, while the literalism of the plane in the sky is shown in one element of this diptych, but juxtaposed to a blonde-wigged figure first seen in 29 Palms. This indicates that every potential narrative element is open to continual reallocation in what amounts to a story without end. And, the interchangeable nature of the images, like a dream, is the state of both a pictorial and affective flux that is the underlying theme pervading Schneider’s photo-narratives. For dream is a site of yearning or longing, either to be with or without, a human pursuit of a restless but uncertain alternative to our daily reality. The scenarios that Schneider sets up nonetheless have to be initiated by the artist. And, this might be best understood by looking at her three recent DVD sequenced photo-novels, Reneé’s Dream and Sidewinder (2005). We have already considered the other called Hitchhiker. In the case of Sidewinder the scenario was created by internet where she met J.D. Rudometkin, an ex-theologian, who agreed to her idea to live with her for five weeks in the scrubland dessert environment of Southern California. The dynamics and unfolding of their relationship, both sexually and emotionally, became the primary subject matter of this series of photographs. The relative isolation and their close proximity, the interactive tensions, conflicts and submissions, are thus recorded to reveal the day-to-day evolution of their relationship. That a time limit was set on this relation-based experiment was not the least important aspect of the project. The text and music accompanying the DVD were written by the American Rudometkin, who speaks poetically of “Torn Stevie. Scars from the weapon to her toes an accidental act of God her father said. On Vaness at California.” The mix of hip reverie and fantasy-based language of his text, echoes the chaotic unfolding of their daily life in this period, and is evident in the almost sun-bleached Polaroid images like Whisky Dance, where the two abandon themselves to the frenetic circumstances of the moment. Thus Sidewinder, a euphemism for both a missile and a rattlesnake, hints at the libidinal and emotional dangers that were risked by Schneider and Rudometkin. Perhaps, more than any other of her photo-novels it was the most spontaneous and immediate, since Schneider’s direct participation mitigated against and narrowed down the space between her life and the art work. The explicit and open character of their relationship at this time (though they have remained friends), opens up the question as the biographical role Schneider plays in all her work. She both makes and directs the work while simultaneously dwelling within the artistic processes as they unfold. Hence she is both author and character, conceiving the frame within which things will take place, and yet subject to the same unpredictable outcomes that emerge in the process. In Reneé’s Dream, issues of role reversal take place as the cowgirl on her horse undermines the male stereotype of Richard Prince’s ‘Marlboro Country’. This photo-work along with several others by Schneider, continue to undermine the focus of the male gaze, for her women are increasingly autonomous and subversive. They challenge the male role of sexual predator, often taking the lead and undermining masculine role play, trading on male fears that their desires can be so easily attained. That she does this by working through archetypal male conventions of American culture, is not the least of the accomplishments in her work. What we are confronted with frequently is of an idyll turned sour, the filmic clichés that Hollywood and American television dramas have promoted for fifty years. The citing of this in the Romantic West, where so many of the male clichés were generated, only adds to the diminishing sense of substance once attributed to these iconic American fabrications. And, that she is able to do this through photographic images rather than film, undercuts the dominance espoused by time-based film. Film feigns to be seamless though we know it is not. Film operates with a story board and setting in which scenes are elaborately arranged and pre-planned. Schneider has thus been able to generate a genre of fragmentary events, the assemblage of a story without a storyboard. But these post-narratological stories require another component, and that component is the viewer who must bring their own interpretation as to what is taking place. If this can be considered the upside of her work, the downside is that she never positions herself by giving a personal opinion as to the events that are taking place in her photographs. But, perhaps, this is nothing more than her use of the operation of chance dictates. I began this essay by speaking about the apparitional contents of Stefanie Schneider’s pictorial narratives, and meant at that time the literal and chance-directed ‘appearing’ qualities of her photographs. Perhaps, at this moment we should also think of the metaphoric contents of the word apparition. There is certainly a spectre-like quality also, a ghostly uncertainty about many of the human experiences found in her subject matter. Is it that the subculture of the American Dream, or the way of life Schneider has chosen to record, has in turn become also the phantom of it former self? Are these empty and fragmented scenarios a mirror of what has become of contemporary America? There is certainly some affection for their contents on the part of the artist, but it is somehow tainted with pessimism and the impossibility of sustainable human relations, with the dissolute and commercial distractions of America today. Whether this is the way it is, or, at least, the way it is perceived by Schneider is hard to assess. There is a bleak lassitude about so many of her characters. But then again the artist has so inured herself into this context over a long protracted period that the boundaries between the events and happenings photographed, and the personal life of Stefanie Schneider, have become similarly opaque. Is it the diagnosis of a condition, or just a recording of a phenomenon? Only the viewer can decide this question. For the status of Schneider’s certain sense of uncertainty is, perhaps, the only truth we may ever know.

1 Kerry Brougher (ed.), Art and Film Since 1945: Hall of Mirrors, ex. cat., The Museum of Contemporary Art (New York, 1996) 2 Im Reich der Phantome: Fotographie des Unsichtbaren, ex. cat., Städtisches Museum Abteiberg Mönchengladbach/Kunsthalle Krems/FotomuseumWinterthur, (Ostfildern-Ruit, 1997) 3 Photoworks: When Pictures Vanish – Sigmar Polke, Museum of Contemporary Art (Zürich-Berlin-New York, 1995) 4 Slavoj Žižek, The Art of the Ridiculous Sublime: On David Lynch’s Lost Highway, Walter Chapin Simpson Center for the Humanities, University of Washington, Seattle, Occasional Papers, no. 1, 2000. 5 Diane Arbus, eds. Doon Arbus, and Marvin Israel...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

3 Stefanie Schneider Polaroid sized unlimited Minis 'Radha Mind Screen' - signed
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
3 Stefanie Schneider Polaroid-sized unlimited Minis 'Radha Mind Screen' - 1999 - triptych signed in front, not mounted. 3 Digital Color Photographs based on the 3 Polaroids. 10.7...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, C Print, Color, Lambda, Polaroid

Six Sons and Daughters of John Wayne - Vintage Photo - 1982
Located in Roma, IT
Vintage Photo. Dedication of the John Wayne Elementary School. New York
Category

1980s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Bent Sound - underwater portrait of Njomza Vitia - archival pigment print 24x35"
Located in Beverly Hills, CA
"Bent Sound" - An ethereal underwater fine art photograph that captures the intersection of music and movement through a portrait of singer Njomza Vitia. This submerged portrait tran...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Dogs USA, Black and White Photograph of Pets in a Sports Car
Located in New york, NY
Dogs, USA, Greenwich, CT is a 5" x 7" black and white photograph, stamped “vintage” by the Freed estate on verso (back) of gelatin silver press. Provenance: Freed archive. The photo...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin, Photographic Film, Photographic Paper

Humphrey Bogart and Audrey Hepburn on Lawn Chairs
Located in Austin, TX
American actor Humphrey Bogart, lighting a cigarette, and Belgian-born actor Audrey Hepburn outdoors on the set of director Billy Wilder's film 'Sabrina', circa 1945. A unique hand-c...
Category

1940s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment

Kate Moss 1993, Paradise Island Bahamas, Original Print Custom Framed
Located in London, GB
For the 1994 Pirelli Calendar shot on the Paradise Island in the Bahamas, photographer Herb Ritts set out to capture in a series of nudes what he called “the gentle innocence” of Kat...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Glass, Wood, Photographic Film, Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print

Renée's Dream - The Boys (Days of Heaven) - Landscape, Horse, Boys
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Renée's Dream - The Boys (Days of Heaven). Part of the 29 Palms, CA project. - 2006 40x50cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs, archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Signatur...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Sammy Davis Jr. Smoking
Located in Austin, TX
Incredible 1960 close up of The Rat Pack's Sammy Davis Jr. side portrait smoking a cigarette. One of the best images we have released in years. One of Sammy Davis, Jr.s enduring leg...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Cosmetic Surgery - Tim Flach, Contemporary British Art, Animal Photography, Dogs
Located in Brighton, GB
Please bear in mind that all prints are produced to order. Lead times between 15-20 days. Edition 2/10 All items are shipped as a print only and come unframed. Tim Flach is a grad...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print, Photographic Paper, Color

Scent of Pink
Located in Dallas, TX
Broqpa is the name of a small village in Nepal. Ziesook first learned of it from a TV documentary, The Last Empire. Ziesook was moved by what she learned about a small village locate...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Screen

Castellum (Horse Portrait, Equine Beauty)
Located in New York City, NY
Large-scale photograph from the Equine Beauty series. The legendary and complex relationship between humans and horses is an enduring one. The horse’s distinctive blend of grace and...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Pigment

Untitled (Kate #15)
Located in Calabasas, CA
Artist: Chuck Close Title: Untitled (Kates #15) Year: 2005 Medium: Digital pigment print on Hahnemuhle Satin paper Edition: 25 + Proofs; signed, dated and numbered in pencil Sheet: 2...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Digital Pigment

Girls in the Windows, Contemporary Fashion Photography, A/P Available
Located in New york, NY
Girls in the Windows, 1960 by Ormond Gigli, is a 38" x 38" (image size) archival pigment print signed by the photographer in an edition of 45 ... is sold out. One piece remains, however, an A/P (artist's proof) Ed. 4/8. The print is signed, titled, and numbered on recto (front of photo) in ink. Print Provenance: artist's archive. **** Girls in the Windows is one of the most collectible photographs...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Archival Pigment, Digital Pigment

Rapture (29 Palms, CA) - Polaroid, Contemporary, Color
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Rapture (29 Palms, CA) - 2022 48x46cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival Print, based on the Polaroid. Artist inventory Number 218829. Signature label and Certificate...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid, Archival Paper

Love - Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative, Photograph, Nude
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Love (The Princess and her Lover) part of the 29 Palms, CA project - 2007, Edition of 1/10, 20x24cm. Digital C-Print based on the Polaroid. Not mounted. Signature label and Cer...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Polaroid, Color, C Print, Archival Paper

Untitled (Kate #13)
Located in Calabasas, CA
Artist: Chuck Close Title: Untitled (Kates #13) Year: 2005 Medium: Digital pigment print on Hahnemuhle Satin paper Edition: 25; signed, dated and numbered in pencil Sheet: 17 x 22 in...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Digital Pigment

Warhol and Basquiat, Black and White Photographic Portrait of Famous Artists
Located in New york, NY
Warhol and Basquiat, 1982 by Christopher Makos is an 8 x 10in vintage gelatin silver print on fiber paper of downtown New York celebrity artists Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat. The photograph is stamped (black ink) on verso (photo back). Provenance: Private Collector *** Artist’s Bio: Christopher Makos (1948- ) is an American photographer and visual artist. He studied architecture in Paris and was an apprentice to Man Ray. Andy Warhol was Makos' good friend and frequent portrait subject. His photographs of Andy Warhol have been exhibited in galleries and museums, including the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao,Tate Modern in London, Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, IVAM in Valencia (Spain), Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid, among others. Makos’ pictures have appeared in publications, including Paris Match and the Wall Street Journal. The visual artist is the author of numerous books, such as Warhol/Makos In Context (2007), Andy Warhol China...
Category

1980s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin

Julian Assange
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Julian Assange 20x20cm, Edition of 10 plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Signature Label and Certificate. Not mounted.
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color

Snap–15 Minutes of Fame (Wastelands) - analog, not mounted, Polaroid
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Snap–15 Minutes of Fame (Wastelands) - 4 pieces, 2003 Edition of 5, 105x100cm each, 220x220cm installed. Analog C-Prints, hand-printed by the artist on Fuji Crystal Archive Paper,...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Jaime King
Located in Austin, TX
From a stunning collection of contemporary nudes from celebrated photographer, Markus Klinko, featuring amongst others, Dita Von Teese, Stoya and Aubrey O’Day This print is availabl...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

Film still of Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white portrait of actress Elizabeth Taylor in headdress for her role in Cleopatra, circa 1963. Cleopatra is a 1963 American epic historical drama film directed by Joseph L...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Portrait of a Young Women in Kenya, Black and White, Meditative
Located in US
"Fabric of Youth" A young Rendille woman named Adato watches over the deserted salt flats of the Chalbi Desert. She is a beacon of hope for the future of her tribe. This image is ...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Naomi Campbell
Located in München, BY
Total Edition of 15 signed and numbered Also available in: 100 x 100 cm / 39.4 x 39.4 in Black and white portrait of Supermodel Naomi Campbell in Paris...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Black and White

Ode to Magritte's Man in a Bowler Hat
Located in New Orleans, LA
16 x 12 inches - Edition 2 of 7 with 2 APs STATEMENT: e2, a collaboration between New Orleans artists Elizabeth Kleinveld and Epaul Julien, re-imagines iconic images from the histor...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

"Brigitte Bidet - Reveal" - Southern Portrait Photography - Drag Queen
Located in Atlanta, GA
Portrait photographer, Jerry Siegel's most recent body of work titled "REVEAL" is about transformation. "We live in a world of costumes - presenting ourselves how we want others to p...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Inkjet

Tall Hat
Located in New York, NY
William Wegman is an American artist renowned for his iconic dog photographs featuring his Weimaraners, who he sees as "perfect fashion models", utilizing their elegant forms and abi...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Pigment

Andy Kissing John Lennon, Black and White Photography of Famous Artists
Located in New york, NY
Andy Kissing John Lennon, 1978 by Christopher Makos is an 8 x 10in vintage gelatin silver print on fiber paper of celebrity artist Andy Warhol kissing John Lennon of the Beatles band. The photograph is stamped (black ink) on verso (photo back). Provenance: Private Collector *** Artist’s Bio: Christopher Makos (1948- ) is an American photographer and visual artist. He studied architecture in Paris and was an apprentice to Man Ray. Andy Warhol was Makos' good friend and frequent portrait subject. His photographs of Andy Warhol have been exhibited in galleries and museums, including the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao,Tate Modern in London, Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, IVAM in Valencia (Spain), Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid, among others. Makos’ pictures have appeared in publications, including Paris Match and the Wall Street Journal. The visual artist is the author of numerous books, such as Warhol/Makos In Context (2007), Andy Warhol China...
Category

1970s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin

Wizard of Oz the Yellow Brick Road
Located in Austin, TX
This is a new limited edition fine art release of a scene from the 1939 movie classic, The Wizard Of Oz This classic scene features the Scare Crow, Tin Man, Dorothy and Toto skipping...
Category

1930s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Archival Ink, Archival Pigment

Untitled (Olancha) - Stranger than Paradise - analog C-Print based on a Polaroid
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Untitled (Olancha) - 2006, 38x37cm. Edition of 5, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Analog C-Print, hand-printed by the artist, based on a Polaroid. Signature label and Certificate. Artist...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Untitled 02 (Oxana's 30th Birthday) starring Radha Mitchell
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Untitled 02 (Oxana's 30th Birthday) - 2007 20x20cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival C-Print print, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist I...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Bette Davis in front of the Queen Mary
Located in Austin, TX
Actress Bette Davis posed in front of the Queen Mary, circa 1967. Bette Davis was an American actress of film, television, and theater. Regarded as one of the greatest actresses in ...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Bedroom Plant (29 Palms, CA) - Polaroid, Contemporary
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Bedroom Plant (29 Palms, CA) - 1999 58x56cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Analog C-Print, hand-printed by the artist, based on the Polaroid. Signature label and Certifica...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Living Room (29 Palms, CA) - Polaroid, Contemporary
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Living Room (29 Palms, CA) - 1999 58x56cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Analog C-Print, hand-printed by the artist, based on the Polaroid. Signature label and Certificate...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Mysteries of Love (Chicks and Chicks and sometimes Cocks)
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Mystery of Love (Chicks and Chicks and sometimes Cocks) - 2017 20x24cm, Edition of 10. Archival C-Print, based on the Polaroid. Artist inventory 21300. Signature label and Certific...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Love - Contemporary, 21st Century, Polaroid, Figurative, Photograph, Nude
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Love (The Princess and her Lover) part of the 29 Palms, CA project, 2007, Edition of 1/10, 20x24cm. Digital C-Print based on a Polaroid. Not mounted. Signature label and Certifica...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Car Crash at Woodhead - Vintage Photograph - 1962
Located in Roma, IT
Car crash at Woodhead is a black and white vintage photo, realized in 1962. The photo depicts a car that falls into a ravine at Woodhead, Cheshire. Mr. John Henry Jones, Labour Memb...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

New York, Jazz City, Musicians, Black and White Photography on Street Music
Located in New york, NY
Drawn to street photography for her early work, Roberta Fineberg shot black-and-white film with a held-held 35mm camera in natural lighting in New York, Paris, and Moscow. Jazz City, New York, 1990 by Roberta Fineberg is a 10" x 8" black-and-white photograph of musicians...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, Photographic Film, Silver Gelatin

Cristal (Till Death Do Us Part) - including the book 'A Half Forgotten Dream'
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Cristal (Till Death Do Us Part) - 2005 Including Stefanie Schneider's new monograph "A Half Forgotten Dream" signed. 192 pages, hardcover, published by Snap Collective, 2024. 20x2...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Instructor (Suburbia) - Contemporary, Polaroid, Photography, Portrait
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Instructor (Suburbia) 2004, 20x24cm, Edition of 1/10, digital C-Print based on a Polaroid, not mounted, Signed on verso with Certificate. Artist Inventory No. 1680.01. This proje...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Ode to Batoni's Virgin of the Annunciation
Located in New Orleans, LA
24 x 20.5 inches - Edition 1 of 5 with 2 APs STATEMENT: e2, a collaboration between New Orleans artists Elizabeth Kleinveld and Epaul Julien, re-imagines iconic images from the hist...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Witch at Window
Located in Sante Fe, NM
In SHE TELLS ALL, Kaur engages questions of identity performance by exploring an ever-present and wildly diverse American identity: the modern American witch. Witches are contemporar...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Red Birkin high heel by Tyler Shields (photograph framed)
Located in New York City, NY
Los Angeles-based photographer Tyler Shields seeks “beauty in chaos,” capturing both young models and celebrities such as Lindsay Lohan and Mischa Barton. His polished editorial imag...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Paper, C Print

Cai by Markus Klinko
Located in Austin, TX
Museum quality fine art print of Cai by photographer Markus Klinko in 2000 in New York. This print is available in the following sizes, signed and numbered by Markus Klinko 24" high...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

Nothing to do with my will (The Princess and her Lover)
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Nothing to do with my Will (The Princess and her Lover) - 2007 part of the 29 Palms, CA project. Edition of 10, 20x24cm. Archival C-Print, based on a Polaroid. Signature labe...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

New York City, Harlem, African American Children 1960s, Muscle Boy, Limited Ed
Located in New york, NY
Muscle Boy is an iconic image by Leonard Freed who was a pioneer in socially conscious photojournalism. In this photo a boy flexes his muscles for the camera perhaps making a state...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Photographic Film, Archival Paper, Digital, Digital Pigmen...

David Bowie, New York, 21st Century, Contemporary, Celebrity, Photography
Located in München, BY
Edition 10 Also available in 40 x 50 cm / 16 x 20 inch, Edition 25 Black and white portrait of Singer and Songwriter David Bowie with guitar. From personality portraits and advert...
Category

1980s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

"Cornette Nude & Hand (Couleur)" by Cécile Plaisance, 27 x 22 in, 2023
Located in Paris, France
Drawing her inspiration from the grand masters of photography – Avedon, Lindbergh, Newton or Toscani, amongst others – Cécile Plaisance uses lenticular printing to allow the viewer t...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Lenticular

Patti Smith
Located in London, GB
David Bailey Patti Smith, 1978 Archival Inkjet on paper Signed by the artist, on verso Image: 36.83 x 47.76 cm Sheet: 42 x 59.4 cm
Category

1970s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Pigment

Tussle -The Princess and her Lover - including the book 'A Half Forgotten Dream'
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Tussle (The Princess and her Lover) - 2009 including Stefanie Schneider's new monograph "A Half Forgotten Dream" signed. 192 pages, hardcover, published by Snap Collective, 2024. ...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Andy Warhol, Edie Sedgwick, Chuck Wein, Iconic Black and White Photography
Located in New york, NY
A 20" x 16" (18.5” x 12.5” image size) gelatin silver print of Andy Warhol, Edie Sedgwick, and Chuck Wein, 1965 by Burt Glinn with the photographer's blind stamp on recto (front lef...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Silver Gelatin, Photographic Paper

Memory Lane (Haley and the Birds) - 29 Palms, CA - based on a Polaroid Original
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Memory Lane (Haley and the Birds) - 29 Palms, CA - 2013 78x76cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival C-Print based on the Polaroid. Certificate and signature label. ...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Marilyn Monroe and Simone Signoret
Located in Austin, TX
Candid capture of star actress Marilyn Monroe with French actress Simone Signoret. Marilyn Monroe was an American actress and model. Known for playing comic "blonde bombshell" chara...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Male nude from the 29 Palms, CA series, 21st Century, Polaroid, Nude Photography
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Male Nude (29 Palms, CA) - 1999 58x56cm, Edition 7/10. Analog C-Print, hand-printed by the artist, based on the Polaroid. Certificate and Signature label. Artist Inventory No. 2...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Alaverdi, Georgia (Groom carrying Bride, spotted dog watching)
Located in Sante Fe, NM
This print is currently featured in our exhibition, Warm Regards, and will be available to ship after the show closes June 24th, 2017. Pentti Sammallahti is a benchmark figure in co...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

The Guardian - Father and Daughter, Child, Black Artist, American Flag, Skyline
Located in Denton, TX
The Guardian by Earlie Hudnall, Jr., is a portrait of a father and daughter standing together. The girl is smiling into the camera while the man wrapped his coat around her to keep h...
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Glitter pour by Tyler Shields (photograph framed)
Located in New York City, NY
Los Angeles-based photographer Tyler Shields seeks “beauty in chaos,” capturing both young models and celebrities such as Lindsay Lohan and Mischa Barton. His polished editorial imag...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Paper, C Print

Windows Chestnut - Tim Flach, Horses, Animal Photography, Contemporary British
Located in Brighton, GB
Please be aware that the US recently imposed an import duty on photographs printed in the last 20 years which may apply if you are purchasing and importing this to the US. Edition 3...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print, Photographic Paper, Color

Contemporary Japanese Photography, Ginzan Spa by Issei Suda, Signed Ed 28/100
By Issei Suda
Located in New york, NY
The photograph "Ginzan Spa, Yamagata, August 1976 from Fushikaden," is by Japanese photographer Issei Suda. The print is hand-signed by the photographer on ...
Category

1970s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Rag Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment, Digi...

The Prince (The Princess and her Lover) - Polaroid, Portrait, Dream
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
The Prince (The Princess and her Lover), 2007, part of the 29 Palms, CA project, Edition of of 10, 20x20cm, digital C-Print based on a Polaroid, Signature label and Certificate, a...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid, Archival Paper

David Bowie "Rebel Rebel" Dutch TV appearance
Located in Austin, TX
Signed limited edition print of David Bowie by Barry Schultz. Taken in Hilversum, Holland at the TOP POP TV studios. Bowie mimed (several times) "Rebel Rebel" the hit single from the...
Category

Late 20th Century Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

Mamie Van Doren and Richard Long Getting Gas
Located in Austin, TX
Vintage capture of Mamie Van Doren and Richard Long getting gas in a classic car. Mamie Van Doren is an American actressmodelsingerand sex symbol. She is perhaps best remembered fo...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment

Helen Frankenthaler, Painter New York City, Photograph of Woman Artist in 1950s
Located in New york, NY
A documentary portrait of Helen Frankenthaler (1925-2011) in her studio in New York in the 1950s. Frankenthaler has remained a major American woman artist and female force of nature ...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin

Lone Wild Horse Looks Over Tall Grass, Meditative, Calming, Equestrian
Located in US
"Windy Solitude" This best-selling image features a single horse on Sable Island as he looks back at the camera. " The print series Discovering the Horses of Sable Island documents...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Brigitte Bardot Petting a Dog
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white candid capture of actress Brigitte Bardot smiling while hugging a large dog. Brigitte Bardot is a French former actress, singer, and model as well as an animal righ...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Classic Comedian and Film Stars of the 30s
Located in Austin, TX
This black-and-white group portrait features some of the greatest stars of the 1920s and 30s all standing together and chatting. From left to right: Bela Lugosi...
Category

1930s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Archival Ink, Archival Pigment

Perfectio
Located in New York City, NY
Large-scale photograph from the Equine Beauty series. The legendary and complex relationship between humans and horses is an enduring one. The horse’s distinctive blend of grace and...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Pigment

Contemporary portrait photography for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Contemporary portrait photography available for sale on 1stDibs. Works in this style were very popular during the 21st Century and Contemporary, but contemporary artists have continued to produce works inspired by this movement. If you’re looking to add portrait photography created in this style to introduce contrast in an otherwise neutral space in your home, the works available on 1stDibs include elements of blue, orange, purple, red and other colors. Many Pop art paintings were created by popular artists on 1stDibs, including Stefanie Schneider, Tyler Shields, Urizen Freaza, and Clare Marie Bailey. Frequently made by artists working with Paper, and Photographic Paper and other materials, all of these pieces for sale are unique and have attracted attention over the years. Not every interior allows for large Contemporary portrait photography, so small editions measuring 1.58 inches across are also available.

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