Portrait of the Icon as a Young Woman: Photography and the Making of Stardom
Files
Media Type
Book
Date of Lecture
10-10-2019
Keywords
Georgia Southern University, Moveable Feast
Description of Lecture
The persona of the celebrity thrives on the tension between images of the public and private—or the performed and the authentic—self. This tension is frozen in time in the many star-studded portraits that comprise “Portrait of the Artist,” an exhibit of photographic portraiture currently on display at the Jepson Center for the Arts. In this lecture, Dr. Conn will discuss the various methods of creating portraits of the “real” person behind the star persona, dispelling the idea that a photographer need only be in the right place at the right time to capture a compelling image. “Behind-the-scenes” photos of stars “as they are” on set often reveal how the stars see themselves, rather than the roles they are scripted to play. As Dr. Konkle will discuss, this is heartbreakingly true for Marilyn Monroe, whose final film role put her in the position of confronting the star persona she had crafted through poised and polished photos with a raw, exposed version of herself as a young woman rather than a star. Together they will explore how the stars we think we see are often a fantasy created by the “ocular proof” of the camera’s lens.
Recommended Citation
Konkle, Amanda and Conn, Bridgett, "Portrait of the Icon as a Young Woman: Photography and the Making of Stardom" (2019). A Moveable Feast: Celebrating the Life of the Mind. 8.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/moveable-feast/8
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Comments
Thursday, Oct. 10, 6 p.m., The Jepson Center for the Arts, Savannah