Assignment Research: Diane Arbus

Diane Arbus was an American photographer whose main subjects were people who at the time lived on the edge of societal acceptance.  She often photographed dwarfs, giants, transvestites, nudists, circus performers and other people either of an ugly or surreal nature.  Many have described her as 'the photographer of freaks,' a title that Arbus was keen to avoid.

Her images were in black and white and more often than not her style would be to crop the images into a square.



Identical Twins, Roselle, New Jersey, 1967



Her images such as this one of identical twins is taken in her usual style.  The subjects always look directly at the camera and are always sharp against the background.  They are usually lit by direct flash but it is hard to tell if this was used here because it looks to have been taken in day light and there is no catch light on the eyes.  They are wearing matching dresses but one twin slightly smiles and one slightly frowns.  The photo has a very haunting nature and Biographer Patricia Bosworth said "She was involved in the question of identity.  Who am I and who are you?  The twin image expresses the crux of that vision: normality in freakishness and the freakishness in normality."

A Young Man in Curlers at Home on West 20th Street, N.Y.C. 1966

This close up shot of a man wearing make up with plucked eyebrows and curlers in his hair was very controversial even leading to someone spitting on it in 1967 at the Museum of Modern Art.  The man is lit from the side possibly by a window and the photograph is cropped to fill the whole frame but importantly leaving in the hand with the long nails.

Child with Toy Hand Grenade in Central Park, New York City, 1962

This image depicts a boy tensely holding a toy hand grenade.  The expression on his face and the way he holds his hand like a claw makes him look like a bit of a maniac.  I like this photograph because of the way the boy is looking at the camera but the composition baffles me.  It seems odd to me that Arbus would compose the picture with a figure in the background clashing with the subjects head and the tree so close to the shoulder is prominent and distracting.  This photograph is quite ironic because one of her critics Norman Mailer once said, "Giving a camera to Diane Arbus is like putting a live grenade in the hands of a child."