Tina Barney is an American photographer who started out photographing her family. The reason why I chose her was simply because of the large format prints she makes and the intense of use of color that is within each of her portraits. What I found most interesting about her work is that her photographs have an almost Diane Arbus feel because of the fact that she goes into the homes of the people she photographs and they are very aware of her presence because she is either using a 4x5 or an 8x10 camera (8x10 is mainly used at home because of how large it is). She also does give them some direction since she is using such a large camera with little mobility. I greatly enjoy her work though because although you can sense in each photograph.
Tina Barney began photographing when she was 28 years old because at that time she felt that the “American Family” was going to become extinct. She began documenting her family first and then moved on to documenting people that she got in contact with over in Paris through friends. She does photograph mainly upper-class family and that is basically because that is what she grew up with. Living in the upper-scale parts of Long Island, New York City, and also New England, she tries to capture the essence of the people within that type of culture.
I came across Tina Barney through a recommendation and first got a taste of work from a documentary that had been taped from the Sundance channel. I feel that after watching the documentary on her that reading about her is so different. I feel you truly get a better sense of how she works and also how she connects with the people she works with.