Remembering legendary fashion photographer Peter Lindbergh

Image credit: Getty Images

Acclaimed photographer Peter Lindbergh, whose cinematic and unretouched images defined an era, died on 3 September, 2019. The news was confirmed by his agent directly with and announced on his official Instagram account on 4 September, at 6pm AEST. He was 74 years old.

With a career spanning over four decades and countless titles, including , Lindbergh photographed the world’s biggest celebrities (from the Duchess of Sussex to Julianne Moore, Uma Thurman and Lupita Nyong’o), capturing them looking completely natural. Lindbergh’s preferred contracts stated he would forgo retouching, a revolutionary move in the age of Photoshop and filters. Meghan Markle declared she was thrilled to work with the German photographer for her 2017 cover because she knew it meant we would finally see her freckles. “It’s not that I care about being truthful,” Lindbergh told in 2017, “it’s the only thing I’m interested in.”

January 1990 British Vogue cover. Credit: Peter Lindbergh

Despite his many celebrity sitters, he is most famous for launching the supermodel phenomenon. In August 1988, he shot a group of soon-to-be supermodels, wearing white shirts on a beach, for American . Then, in November that same year, he shot for Anna Wintour’s first issue as editor-in-chief of American , featuring Israeli model Michaela Bercu on the cover (hair down and smiling, in a bejewelled Christian Lacroix top). He went on to shoot the iconic 1990 cover of British – establishing Linda Evangelista, Tatjana Patitz, Naomi Campbell, Christy Turlington and Cindy Crawford as verified supers. 

His bare-faced photographs – equal parts timeless and radical – are widely seen as a response to the hard glamour of the late 1980s; a declaration of independence and freedom for a new generation. “It was time to question that stereotype and move towards a kind of beauty more linked to the personality of the woman rather than the status symbol,” Lindbergh said in conversation with curator Maria Vittoria Baravelli. This sense of emancipated beauty was a career-long theme and focus for Lindbergh. “This should be the responsibility of photographers today: to free women, and finally everyone, from the terror of youth and perfection,” he wrote in his 2015 book, (Schirmer Mosel). 

Peter Lindbergh and editor-in-chief of Vogue Italia Franca Sozzani attend the Peter Lindbergh artist reception on September 7, 2013 in New York City. Image credit: Getty Images

Intimate black-and-white portraits became another Lindbergh trademark. Influenced by the work of street photographer Garry Winogrand and Depression-era documentary photographer Dorothea Lange, he told Italia that this medium was, for him, “connected to the image’s deeper truth, to its most hidden meaning”. Czech supermodel Eva Herzigova, who Lindbergh photographed many times during her career, told : “Peter has taken pictures of me since I was 16 years old. I felt protected in his company and absolutely adored those stunning black and white images that expressed women’s strength through their eyes. He was capable of capturing people’s soul [in an image].” 

Despite his artistic sensibilities – Lindbergh was outspoken about the importance of remaining a photographer, rather than an employee, beholden to the ideas of editors and clients – he was also behind some of the most recognisable ad campaigns of our time, including Calvin Klein, Armani and Comme des Garçons. He is also the only photographer to date to shoot three Pirelli calendars (1996, 2002 and 2017). 

Model Linda Evangelista attends the Peter Lindbergh artist reception presented by Vladimir Restoin Roitfeld on September 7, 2013 in New York City. Image credit: Getty Images

Born in Leszno, western Poland, on 23 November, 1944, Lindbergh was only months old when his family was forced to flee their home following invasion. The youngest of three children, he was raised in Duisburg, a small industrial town in northern Germany. He left school at 14 to work as a window dresser at a local department store, Karstadt, before moving to Switzerland at 18 to avoid military service. He eventually settled in Berlin. There, he became fascinated by art, music and museums. “I was like a dry towel,” he told in 2016, “I sucked up everything.” 

He enrolled at Berlin’s Academy of Fine Arts, but left to travel to Arles, inspired by his idol, Vincent van Gogh. After eight months of painting and selling his work at local markets, he took to the road again, hitchhiking around Europe and North Africa. He returned to Berlin a different man by all accounts, and discovered photography, and his metier, by accident. “My brother had fabulous children before I had children and for some reason I wanted to photograph them, and that was when I got my first camera. Children have something totally unconscious about them. That’s how I learned,” he told in 2016.

September 1992 British Vogue cover featuring Linda Evangelista. Credit: Peter Lindbergh

He then worked as an assistant to German photographer Hans Lux for two years, before opening his first studio in Düsseldorf, in 1973. His first ad campaign was for VW Golf, and his first fashion shoot came in 1978, for magazine. That same year he moved to Paris, and while he also had homes in Arles and New York, he would continue to live and work from the French capital for the rest of his life, in relative privacy. He never published anything personal on his social media accounts and encouraged people to look at his photos rather than refer to his private life. 

Lindbergh is survived by his wife Petra, his first wife Astrid, his four sons Benjamin, Jérémy, Simon, Joseph and seven grandchildren.

Peter Lindbergh and David Beckham on September 9, 2014 in New York City. Image credit: Getty Images

(From left to right) Lindsay Ellingson, Karolina Kurkova, Peter Lindbergh, Doutzen Kroes, and Irina Shayk attend the Peter Lindbergh artist reception presented by Vladimir Restoin Roitfeld on September 7, 2013 in New York City. Image credit: Getty Images

Grace Coddington and Peter Lindbergh attend the 2014 amfAR New York Gala on February 5, 2014 in New York City. Image credit: Getty Images

Rihanna and Peter Lindbergh attend the Fenty Launch on May 22,
2019 in Paris, France. Image credit: Getty Images

September 2019 British Vogue cover. Credit: Peter Lindbergh

Linda Evangelista, British Vogue, February 1988. Credit: Peter Lindbergh

Linda Evangelista, British Vogue, August 1988. Credit: Peter Lindbergh

Cindy Crawford, British Vogue, May 1987. Credit: Peter Lindbergh

Yasmin Le Bon, British Vogue, October 1987. Credit: Peter LindberghClick Here: NRL league Jerseys