Annie Leibovitz and Gloria Steinem Celebrate New Book About Women

Even though Annie Leibovitz prefers to be behind-the-scenes, she was the main attraction for a cocktail party Wednesday night at Gallery 525.

The New York crowd gathered for the debut of the “Annie Leibovitz: Women” pop-up exhibition and the just-out Phaidon book by the same name that features an abundance of high-profile women — and everyday ones too. Gloria Steinem, Anna Wintour, Salman Rushdie, Twyla Tharp, Mark Guiducci, Martha Stewart, Giovanna Battaglia Engelbert, Karen Elson, Fran Lebowitz, Sally Hershberger, Cass Bird, Grace Coddington, Andrew Wylie, Jonathan Becker and Rachel Eliza Griffiths were among the guests, who cycled through the mixer.

Having approached the second volume of “’Women’ like a magazine,” Leibovitz said it was wrapped up within a year and that many of the images were from Vogue assignments. Even though Leibovitz’s photography was the centerpiece of the celebration, she deflected the attention to Steinem, whom she praised repeatedly. Quoting her good friend and collaborator Steinem’s essay in the book, the lenswoman said, “How you are seen is different than how you see yourself.”

Perception versus reality can be a thorny topic in this always-ready-for-a-closeup world, but guests celebrated a certain groundedness. Steinem told attendees: “I just want to make sure that this night changes your life in a good way and in a way that this artistic genius has done. So, make sure that you say ‘hello’ to a couple of people that you don’t know, say what you do, what your care about, organize, make trouble, and make sure that this night is as changeful and miraculous as this person right here.”

Leibovitz added: “In my line of work, ‘icon’ is a word that is used a lot, but Gloria is one of the few people who qualifies.

“We should celebrate,” she said to much applause. “We gave a talk last night at the [Brooklyn] Paramount theater and we were bumped out of there because [incoming New York City mayor Zohran] Mamdani was having his victory party. But it was for a good reason.” 

Having first met her when she was looking for a female photographer to shoot the covers for Ms. Magazine in the 1970s, Steinem said there weren’t many at that time that had their own studios. “It was just luck,” Steinem said. “She is authentic, always herself, funny, smart, interested in other people — that’s why she’s a photographer. She went all the way to Oklahoma to shoot the chief of the Cherokee Nation. For a girl from New York to [go to] Oklahoma in the middle of the countryside is not easy, but that’s who she is. She wants to photograph the real person where they live.”

Salman Rushdie recalled how when he first came to New York City in 2000, Leibovitz took his book jacket photograph, which he used for years. Glancing at a black-and-white close-up of the writer Susan Sontag (who was Leibovitz’s partner) as it flashed on one of the walls of Gallery 525, he said: “Susan was a good friend of mine. That is one of the ways that I got to know Annie, because Susan was a really close pal.”

As for how Leibovitz draws her subjects out, Rushdie said: “The thing that makes a portrait photographer special is paying attention. Annie pays attention to the subject so that she sees them and that shows on film.”

Having just released his 23rd book “The Eleventh Hour,” Rushdie will be making the rounds to promote it starting off with a talk at the 92NY and then hitting the road. “It’s been a long time since I did it, since there was the attack and before that the pandemic. It’s been five or six years since I’ve done any of that. I’m looking forward to it,” he said.

In 2022, the author was stabbed before the start of a public appearance in Chautauqua, N.Y. The incident blinded him in one eye.

A slide show of Leibovitz’ many famous subjects was splashed on the walls of the gallery night for guests to take in. Spanning from the late short story writer Eudora Welty to the more au courant Zendaya, the portraits were also snapshots of time. They saw a bare-bellied and pregnant Rihanna reclining in a fur coat looking as relaxed as can be in 2022; Kim Kardashian taking a selfie while holding her then baby daughter North as Kanye West photographed them on an iPad in a mirrored nursery; the socialite and philanthropist Brooke Astor stands in what appears to be a sitting room in a black skirt suit, hat and gloves with arm akimbo, and Joan Didion, a lioness in American writing, seated at a home office desk with her arms crossed.

Martha Stewart remembered shooting one of the “Got Milk?” ads with Leibovitz, and how she tried to milk it in more ways than one. In 1997, Stewart was pictured wearing overalls, an oversized barn jacket, and over-the-knee mud boots with her arm wrapped around the neck of a cow. The photographer tried to get the hospitality and lifestyle maven to buy the dairy cow after the shoot. Stewart said with a laugh, “I said no. But I didn’t have a farm yet,” she said. “It was very funny.” 

Complimented for the flashback photo of Stewart that appeared in Wednesday’s New York Times, she said, “It was good, right? 1982.”

Lebowitz had her own tale about Leibovitz, recalling how she was photographed for Vogue “about a hundred years.” After seeing the contact sheets, Lebowitz noticed that the number of her landline could easily be read; she called Leibovitz to tell her to take that out, and was assured that would happen. “I knew Vogue had come out when my phone started ringing with millions of people calling. She didn’t take it out. I don’t have that phone number anymore,” she said.

The author and social observer has been touring internationally for speaking engagements with her next stop being Dec. 12 at Carnegie Hall. “In every place that I go to, I do a lot of work in Europe and Scandinavia, everybody is hysterical about Donald Trump. I just got back from Europe and Scandinavia. Every place I went they asked me about the New York [City] mayoral election, which had never happened before. Finally, I said, ‘I’ll answer the question, but you live in Zurich. What does it mean to you who the mayor is? I don’t know who the mayor of Zurich is and I don’t care.’”

As for how Mamdani may change the city, Lebowitz said, “I think that really New York changes the mayor more than the mayor changes New York.”

Asked to define the depth of Leibovitz’s talent, Wintour said: “Bottomless. What’s so extraordinary when you see so many of her images together is how clear the point of view is. The strength in vision and what she sees in women in photographs is hard to describe. When you watch her take a picture or you are photographed by her, there is no hesitation. She knows exactly where she wants the subject, and how she wants them to look. And all the references that she has, you know so many people have mood boards or whatever it may be, her references are always her own images. Of course, she takes it and makes it new and different. Like a great designer, a great filmmaker or a great artist, [to have] the understanding of who you are, and what you want to achieve with your art, that’s a gift.”

Describing Leibovitz as “extraordinary,” Coddington, who joined forces with her on many occasions, said it was never “a click-click” situation with the sharpshooter “really thinking things through.”

Coddington said: “She does a lot of research and really gets into the person and into everything, even the location. She’s amazing. But tough — very tough. Anything that comes easy is usually not good.”

The former Vogue editor is crafting a new book with Phaidon that will highlight the years that followed after she left Vogue, but it will still include a lot of the shoots that she worked on for Vogue as a freelancer. Steinem also hopes to get to more writing, especially essays. 

Asked about how Meghan Markle paid her a visit recently, Steinem said they initially met during the pandemic, when she spent some time in California. As for the media’s treatment of Markle, Steinem said: “I don’t see it all so I’m not a judge. But I don’t think they understand her whole life. She has been punished in a way that the British royal family is punished. They’re photographed everywhere they go. It’s very difficult to live a life. I had met her husband [Prince Harry in his 20s] before she met her husband at a meeting in Italy. It was easy to see how hard it was for him to lead a normal life.”