Annie Leibovitz, photographer of stars, faces ruin

Breitbart ^ | August 23, 2009 | unk

[OldCorps]

Annie Leibovitz is as famous as the people she photographs but now the genius behind the lens is close to financial ruin -- a victim, some say, of her own relentless artistic ambition. Among the qualities making Leibovitz, 59, the most sought after portrait photographer in the world are legendary perfectionism and the pouring of resources into lavish sets. Over the course of her long career, nothing has been too extreme in Leibovitz's pursuit of the perfect picture. She put former action icon and current California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger on top of a mountain, submerged black actress Whoopi Goldberg in a bath of milk and closed France's Versailles palace to shoot Kirsten Dunst posing as Marie-Antoinette. Circus animals, fire, airplanes -- she was rarely denied a requested prop, however seemingly outrageous.

A debt is due September 8 and if she can't pay up, she could lose her life's work. ACG, which specializes in making loans to owners of high value art works, is unlikely to adopt a soft line. Leibovitz must "comply with the sales agreement she signed authorizing Art Capital to sell the fine art and real estate assets and to pay the invoices that are due," ACG spokesman Montieth Illingworth said in a statement. The over-leveraged photographer not only risks losing her photo archives, which The New York Times estimates could be worth 50 million dollars, but also her house in the trendy Greenwich Village district of Manhattan and a second home outside the city. If she is forced to declare bankruptcy, it will then be up to the courts to decide how to distribute the assets. Banking giant Goldman Sachs entered the fray this week with a claim to own part of Leibovitz's debt. ACG disputes that, but says Goldman Sachs could ...

[Clemenza]

but also her house in the trendy Greenwich Village district of Manhattan and a second home outside the city.

OMG! She may have to move to Greenpoint or Astoria! Perish the thought (and the fact that she will be another pretentious artiste pouring into said neighborhoods).

[Lancey Howard]

You should see the great pictures of my kids I took out in the front yard.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Odds she voted for Obama: 79%

Aside from the nitpicking observation that odds are specified as a ratio of favorable to unfavorable outcomes (e.g., "5-8 against"), the probability that she voted for 0bama exceeds 100%.

[canuck_conservative]

Excellent graphic! LOL

[Albion Wilde]

Sounds like New York's trendy, Greenwich Village, liberal lesbian Vogue, Rolling Stone and New York Magazine commoooonity needs to come to her aid, have a benefit for her and distribute her works among themselves.

Don't count on it.

[Aria]

I saw that...pretty funny!

[wardaddy]

btw....to her credit...her photo-portraits are actually very very good

[EDINVA]

omg, hilarious

[Loud Mime]

She did those photos of Miley Cyrus, so she may claim to be a victim of right wingers.....

[Albion Wilde]

New York artist ping

[Loud Mime]

Is there a version in English?

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

So take some more damn pictures and earn some more cash.

My daughter's getting married soon. Does she have any references?

[_Jim]

You are cold!

[taildragger]

Did Golman come in to help is the Million Dollar question, given she is a big NY Lib known by everybody.

She is also that "artist" that did that over the edge (IMHO) of Miley Cyrus.

Oh well, in terms of lower cost housing, and an up and coming place for those liberal on the edge trying to do something edgy like living in a loft of an old factory, she can always look to Detroit....

[SIDENET]

And they say that zombies don’t exist.

[taildragger]

I didn’t know Joan Rivers played guitar? Or is that Nancy Pelosi before her shots?

[netmilsmom]

>>You should see the great pictures of my kids I took out in the front yard.<<

Amen!

[netmilsmom]

So are mine.
And I don’t over spend my money and whine when my house loses 100,000 in value.

[Albion Wilde]

Speaking as someone who worked in the arts for many years, hired many photographers for projects and always loved and admired her work (she is perhaps the first woman commercial photographer to achieve this fame as a portraitist), I am sorry for this collapse. She did much to promote the entertainment culture that has proved ruinous for our culture; but her crafts"man"ship is impeccable. Perhaps she can come to understand life for the rest of us through this incident. I am thinking now of the haunting Depression-era candid photography of Dorothea Lange.

Leibowitz's politics and feminism have hurt her in the long run, it seems; since a good left-brained, hard-nosed male accountant or business manager with a conservative investment strategy could have helped her. It would be tragic to see this life's work strewn about. I hope some NY museum curators are trying to work out a plan; but everybody is strapped these days.

Migrant mother by Dorothea Lange, 1938.........Schwartzenegger by Annie Leibowitz, 1988

[SIDENET]

My daughter's getting married soon. Does she have any references?

She took pictures of Whoopi Goldberg in a bath of milk.

(retching)