Diane Arbus Photographs

Diane Arbus took photographs that are confrontational and controversial. She had the capacity to reveal tragedy and absurdity in the circumstances of peoples' lives. Her subjects were people drawn both from the edges of society and from middle class and affluent backgrounds similar to her own.

Born in 1923, into a middle-class New York family, Arbus began her career working in fashion photography with her husband, Allan Arbus. She ceased fashion work in 1956 and soon after studied photography under Lisette Model at the New School for Social Research. Her subsequent photographs were predominantly portraits. During the 1960s her photographs were published in magazines such as Harper's Bazaar and Esquire; she made little distinction between magazine assignments and private work. The importance of Arbus's work was recognised during the time of her short career; she was awarded Guggenheim Fellowships in 1963 and 1966, and her photographs were included in the New Documents exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1967. Diane Arbus's photographs have continued to attract audiences and to be critically appraised since she took her own life in 1971.

Kate Davidson

Department of Photography, Australian National Gallery, Canberra, 1991