Courtesy of UBS. © Peter Macdiarmid
“Annie Leibovitz’s exhibition “WOMEN: New Portraits” just completed its 10 city global tour, which included stops in Hong Kong, Mexico, New York and London. The final showcase took place in Zurich, Switzerland, the home of the exhibition’s commissioning partner, UBS. The work is a continuation of Leibovitz’s “WOMEN” portrait series, which began 17 years ago and features women of outstanding achievement. This diverse group of women includes artists, CEOs, politicians and philanthropists, amongst others. Existing photographs of famous women who are at the top of their fields, such as Meryl Streep, Queen Elisabeth II or Hilary Clinton, were showcased next to 22 new portraits of outstanding personalities, such as Adele, Venus and Serena Williams or Sheryl Sandberg.
Annie Leibovitz and UBS brought together images of strong women from all over the world with different backgrounds, nationalities and paths, with the purpose of inspiring others and sending a powerful message about diversity and female empowerment in an original and real way.
The exhibition counted over 200’000 visitors and additionally offered 200 free learning events, which were presented in collaboration with 28 universities, 10 leading cultural organizations and over 150 women’s groups.”
THE WORK
Brendan was brought on board to consult with Annie Leibovitz Studio by Dissident Industries to design and build a 24K video wall system to display Women: New Portraits as a video slideshow - her first digital exhibition. Mr. Bellomo was then commissioned to edit the slideshow personally with Ms. Leibovitz, traveling from country-to-country and expanding the show as it evolved to include new portraiture from Ms. Leibovitz’s journey. He worked one-on-one with the photographer to supervise the pacing, sequencing, color and formatting of decades worth of groundbreaking portraiture, fusing classical photo pagination with modern non-linear editing. The slideshow was then uploaded to the customized displays, which implemented a proprietary process maintaining original gamut of Ms. Leibovitz’s printed colors. This married the tangible feel of her analog prints with the scale and detail of the ultra-high resolution video walls. Brendan worked with Producer Matthew Shattuck to deploy the popup show in 10 countries, where it opened as a free exhibit attended by thousands of people all over the world.
THE CITIES
ZURICH Courtesy of UBS
MEXICO CITY Courtesy of UBS
NEW YORK Courtesy of UBS
HONG KONG Courtesy of UBS
TOKYO Courtesy of UBS
FRANKFURT Courtesy of UBS
SINGAPORE Courtesy of UBS
LONDON Courtesy of UBS
MILAN Courtesy of UBS
SAN FRANCISCO Courtesy of UBS