Skip to main content

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.

to
300
3,308
2,429
912
725
1,517
Overall Width
to
Overall Height
to
6
3,051
5,841
1
2
11
66
76
393
482
417
460
675
3,622
630
471
95
41
22
14
14
13
10
6
5
3
4,204
3,355
1,316
6,012
3,275
3,262
2,519
2,343
2,289
1,549
635
619
579
525
484
471
448
414
389
381
340
321
311
4,206
3,385
3,306
2,926
2,865
1,292
190
189
144
114
1,202
3,358
6,125
2,160
Style: Contemporary
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

Gaudi Cathedral, Barcelona, Spain, Child on Swing, Black and White Photography
Located in New york, NY
Burt Glinn's The Sagrada Familia, Barcelona, Swing, 1959, is a gelatin silver print, 20 x 16, signed and stamped print, authenticated by the estate. A young girl swings carefree agai...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin

In Bloom - Contemporary, Woman, Polaroid
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
In Bloom - 2022 50x50cm. Edition of 10 plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival Print based on an original Polaroid on Hahnemuhle photo rag paper. Signature label and certificate. Not mo...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Color, Archival Pigment, Polaroid

Fred Astaire Sitting in Window
Located in Austin, TX
Fred Astaire was an American dancer, singer, actor, choreographer, and television presenter. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential dancers in the history of film and t...
Category

1930s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Marilyn Monroe: Pinup in High-Slit Dress
Located in Austin, TX
Stunning image of Marilyn Monroe posed pinup style in a high-slit dress. This listing is for a limited edition archival print. What's included: - Limited Edition Archival Print - N...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Marilyn Monroe Reading Reference Vintage Press Print
Located in Austin, TX
Color photo depicting starlet Marilyn Monroe reading Dun & Bradstreet Reference and The Wall Street Journal. -- One-of-a-kind original vintage press p...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Black and White

Jared Leto, Contemporary, Celebrity, Photography, Portrait
Located in München, BY
Combined Edition 25 Also available in 50 x 60 cm/ 20 x 24 inch and as combined Edition 10 in 76 x 101 cm / 30 x 40 inch 101 x 127 cm / 40 x 50 inch Portrait of American actor and mu...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

John Silhouette
Located in Hudson, NY
Listing is for UNFRAMED print. Inquire within for framing. Edition of 15. CURRENT EXHIBITION - runs through October 30th, 2016. Any framed photographs purchased during the show wi...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Marilyn Monroe in Black Sequin Gown Vintage Press Print
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white pinup portrait of star actress Marilyn Monroe in a black sequin gown. -- One-of-a-kind original vintage press print from the Celebrity Vault archives. Own a piece of history and kick-start your collection with our one-of-a-kind pieces of your favorite celebrities. -- "The Marilyn Monroe community was shocked and stunned at the untimely passing of truly one of the greatest Monroe sculptors of all time, Kim Goodwin...
Category

1940s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Black and White

Learning to fly - Contemporary, Portrait, Women, Polaroid, Nude
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
'Learning to fly', 2020 20x20cm, Edition 1/7 plus 2 Artist Proofs, digital C-Print based on a Polaroid, not mounted. Signed on the back and with certificate. Artist inventory - P...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

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

Michael Jackson, Los Angeles, 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 famous singer and songwriter Michael Jackson. From personality portraits and adverti...
Category

1980s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Queen Elizabeth II - Vintage Photograph - 1968
Located in Roma, IT
Queen Elizabeth II- Vintage Photo is a black-and-white photograph, realized in1968, Garden Party in Marlborough House Good condition.
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Natalie Wood Classic Portrait
Located in Austin, TX
Frank Worth captured this classic image of Natalie Wood in 1952. At this point, Wood was already a star having starred in films including Miracle on 34th Street as a child but had no...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment

Portrait of Sophia Loren
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white portrait of actress Sophia Loren What's included: - Limited Edition Archival Print - Numbered Certificate of Authenticity More About Globe Photos: Globe Photos hous...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Elizabeth Taylor in Leopard Print Coat
Located in Austin, TX
Elizabeth Taylor standing candid in leopard pringt, leaning on doorway and her dog beside her. This listing is for a limited edition archival print. What's included: - Limited Edit...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

David Bowie by Brian Aris
Located in Austin, TX
Signed limited edition 16.5" x 23" print of David Bowie by Brian Aris in 1991. Brian Aris limited edition prints, signed and numbered by Brian and carryin...
Category

Late 20th Century Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Giclée

Lollipop Mini - mounted - featuring Radha Mitchell, based on a Polaroid
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Stefanie Schneider's Minis - The size of a Polaroid. Lollipop (Beachshoot) featuring Radha Mitchell, 2005. Lambda digital Color Photographs based on the Polaroid. Sandwiched in ...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Paper, Color, Lambda, Polaroid

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

Eaten - Contemporary, Women, Polaroid, 21st Century, Color
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
'Eaten' 2019, 20x20cm, Edition 1/7 plus 2 Artist Proofs Digital C-Print, based on a Polaroid, not mounted. Signed on the back and with certificate. Artist inventory PL219-645. Kirst...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Marilyn Monroe Smiling in a Fedora Vintage Press Print
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white capture of star actress Marilyn Monroe smiling close up, wearing a fedora. -- One-of-a-kind original vintage press print from the Celebrity Vault archives. Own a pie...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Black and White

Salvador Dali in Venice
Located in Austin, TX
Photo of Salvador Dali in Venice holding cane and looking up. Salvador Dali was a Spanish surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Michael Jackson
Located in München, BY
Edition 15, Lenticular In this image Michael Jackson is doing the moonwalk and is x-rayed. A man with x-ray vision, NICK VEASEY creates art that shows what it is really like inside...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Lenticular

Untitled (Tattooing)
Located in New York, NY
Digital C-print Stamped and numbered, verso 20 x 24 inches (Edition of 10) 30 x 40 inches (Edition of 5) 50 x 60 inches (Edition of 3) This photograph is offered by ClampArt, loc...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

Iconic Portrait of a Young Man Wearing Tribal Face Paint, Ethiopia, Fashion
Located in US
"Untitled 37" Wearing face paint is typical in the Karo tribe. While the designs are based on tradition, each young man is encouraged to create their own motif. This award-winnin...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Frank Sinatra Posed in Thunderbird
Located in Austin, TX
Circa 1955 in Hollywood, California: American actor and Hollywood icon Frank Sinatra poses with his 1955 'T-bird' Ford Thunderbird convertible sports car for a 1950's Ford Thunderbir...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

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

Lady Gaga Hello Kitty Anniversary
Located in Austin, TX
Museum quality fine art print of Lady Gaga by photographer Markus Klinko. Shot in 2009 in London for 35th anniversary of Hello Kitty. This print is availa...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

Eve Arnold - Anthony Quinn and Anna Karina, Photography 1976, Printed After
Located in Greenwich, CT
A model in Harlem, New York City in 1968. All available sizes and editions: 20" x 24", Edition of 25 + 3 Artist Proofs 24" x 34", Edition of 25 + 3 Artist Proofs "Eve Arnold, born ...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

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

It would soon be time
Located in Sante Fe, NM
Maggie Taylor creates evocative single-scene narratives in her whimsical and often elaborate photomontages. Working intuitively, Taylor combines 19th Century photographs, found objec...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Divine Nude No.21 by Ronald Martinez - Fine art photography, Renaissance, woman
Located in Paris, FR
Divine Nude No.21 is a limited-edition photograph by French contemporary artist Ronald Martinez. This photograph is sold unframed as a print only. It...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print

Odessa, Ukraine (Man repairing vehicle on sidewalk & Black dog)
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

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Sophia Loren Shooting Pool
Located in Austin, TX
A Vintage 1958 Photograph featuring Italian actress Sophia Loren showing her skills in billiards as captured by the Italian photo agency Liverani of Rome during a private shoot. Sop...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Marilyn Monroe in Nightgown for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes Vintage Press Print
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white promo photo of Marilyn Monroe posed in a a black nightgown for her role in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes", circa 1953. -- One-of-a-kind original vintage press print from...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Black and White

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

Diana Ross, Contemporary, Celebrity, Photography, Portrait
Located in München, BY
Combined Edition 25 Also available in 50 x 60 cm/ 20 x 24 inch and as combined Edition 10 in 76 x 101 cm / 30 x 40 inch 101 x 127 cm / 40 x 50 inch Portrait of famous American sing...
Category

1980s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival 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

Fire Hydrant, Harlem, Portrait Photography of African American Children 1960s
Located in New york, NY
Punctuated by documentary photo essays such as Black in White America, Fire Hydrant is one of Leonard Freed's most iconic in the Harlem series. In the image of Fire Hydrant, two chil...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment, Digital Pi...

Equestrian Portrait of a Speckled Horse, Fashion-Inspired, Horizontal
Located in US
"Speckled Crest" This iconic portrait draws the eye towards this speckled horse's exquisite features. This image has received several awards, including the highest honor of Gold at ...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Marilyn Monroe: Hollywood's Glamour Icon
Located in Austin, TX
This beautifully colored image features a pinup of actress and Hollywood bombshell Marilyn Monroe posed in a bathing suit with her leg uppoolside. Marilyn Monroe was one of the mo...
Category

1940s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment

Burlesque Series, Catherine D'Lish in Champagne Coupe II Tease-O-Rama, Hollywood
Located in Cambridge, GB
Catherine D'Lish in Champagne Coupe, Richard Heeps photograph taken at the American Hollywood Burlesque event Tease-O-Rama. This artwork is a limited edition of 25, gloss photograph...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Silver Gelatin

Muhammad Ali Training
Located in Austin, TX
Color capture of Muhammad Ali training in a boxing ring. Muhammad Ali was an American professional boxer and activist. Nicknamed "the Greatest", he is regarded as one of the most si...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Rita Hayworth in Swimming Suit
Located in Austin, TX
Rita Hayworth in bathing suit, posed pin-up style on boat wheel. Rita Hayworth was an American actress, dancer, and pin-up girl. She achieved fame in the 1940s as one of the top sta...
Category

1940s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Sean
Located in New York, NY
Archival pigment print Signed and numbered, verso 24 x 30 inches (Edition of 6) 30 x 40 inches (Edition of 6) This photograph is offered by ClampArt, located in New York City. Plea...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Elvis Presley in Shadow
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white candid capture of the King, Elvis Presley, gazing to the camera in a true action shot of the Rock N Roll star. Elvis Presley known mononymously as Elvis, was an Amer...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Helen Frankenthaler, Painter in the Studio, Photograph of Woman Artist 1950s
Located in New york, NY
A portrait of Helen Frankenthaler (1925-2011) in her studio in New York. Glinn captures the celebrated artist, Frankenthaler, in the process of making art - surrounded by paint, mate...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Film, Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin

Clint Eastwood, Unforgiven
Located in New York, NY
This photograph of Clint Eastwood taken by Eddie Adams is offered by CLAMP in New York City.
Category

1990s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

Gloria DeHaven Glamour Portrait
Located in Austin, TX
This stunning black and white studio portrait features Gloria Dehaven posed in a captivating glamour portrait. Gloria DaHaven was an American actress and singer who was a contract st...
Category

1940s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Rimon, Photography, Limited Edition
Located in München, BY
Limited Edition of 10 Framed size 27 x 37 cm All works are Archival Pigment prints, floating in an all black wooden frame behind museums glass.  More sizes on request. Sara Punt's w...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Ava Gardner at Academy Awards
Located in Austin, TX
Color portrait of Ava Gardner smiling at The Academy Awards in fur and tiara. Ava Lavinia Gardner was an American actress and singer. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Be...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment

Katharine Hepburn with Dogs
Located in Austin, TX
"Black and white candid capture of actress Katharine Hepburn smiling outdoors with her dogs, circa 1938. Katharine Hepburn was an American actress whose career as a Hollywood leadin...
Category

1930s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Elizabeth Taylor with Vintage Camera
Located in Austin, TX
Actress Elizabeth Taylor takes a photo with a Rollieflex twin lens medium format reflex camera wearing a cowboy hat and sunglasses and smoking a cigarette on the set of the movie 'Giant' which was released on November 24, 1956. Giant is a 1956 American epic Western drama film about sprawling epic covering the life of a Texas cattle rancher and his family and associates. Directed by George Stevens from a screenplay adapted by Fred Guiol and Ivan Moffat from Edna Ferber...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment

Elizabeth Taylor with Vintage Camera
Located in Austin, TX
Actress Elizabeth Taylor takes a photo with a Rollieflex twin lens medium format reflex camera wearing a cowboy hat and sunglasses and smoking a cigarette on the set of the movie 'Gi...
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital, Archival Pigment

Red Polka Dot Dress, Goodwood Revival - Vintage Fashion Photograph
Located in Cambridge, GB
This stylish artwork, 'Red Polka Dot Dress' taken at the glamorous retro event Goodwood Revival, perfectly captures feminine sophistication with a ...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Silver Gelatin

The German-American Actress Barbara Bouchet - Vintage photo - 1980s
Located in Roma, IT
Vintage Photo. In this photograph, The German-American Actress Barbara Bouchet is with Saverio Vallone and Marina Souma(?)
Category

1980s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Cassius Clay vs. Floyd Patterson
Located in Austin, TX
Muhammad Ali (Cassius Clay) was an American professional boxer, activist, and philanthropist. He is widely regarded as one of the most significant and celebrated sports figures of th...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

The Beatles in Heavy Coats
Located in Austin, TX
Black and white capture of The Beatles posed in heavy coats. The Beatles were an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. The core lineup of the band comprised John Lennon, P...
Category

1960s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Humphrey Bogart: Film Noir Superstar
Located in Austin, TX
Humphrey Bogart is remembered as a beloved American film star. He starred in 75 movies over his 30 year career. Although Bogart is known for his film acting, he began his career on B...
Category

1940s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

Ernest Hemingway - Vintage Photograph - 1950s
Located in Roma, IT
Hemingway -  Vintage Photo is a black and white photograph realized in the 1950s. Good conditions.
Category

1950s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Museo Archeologico II, Napoli
Located in New York, NY
Museo Archeologico II, Napoli, 2018 C-print Signed, titled, dated and numbered edition of 5 on artist's label on verso. 39.5 x 47.5 inches 47.5 x 59 inches 71 x 88.5 inches The p...
Category

2010s Contemporary Portrait Photography

Materials

C Print

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.

Recently Viewed

View All