J oel - P eter W it k i n
the g iver
Andrea Blanch: Can you talk about how you came to work with Edward Steichen at 16-years-old?
Joel-Peter Witkin: First, I didn’t “work” with Edward Steichen. I had accrued 30 or 40 slides. I didn’t
make black-and-white prints. I couldn’t afford all that. I was just a kid. I had a Kodak Pony with a Kodachrome film. I would go around photographing what I thought I was really beautiful. I edited about 20 of
those images, and I just made an appointment through his secretary. I took the box of slides, and said, “I’m
presenting these for Mr. Steichen to look at.” After 15 minutes, he came out and asked me to come over
to the viewing box. I explained the work the best I could. He chose one for the permanent collection, and
also for an exhibition coming up called “Masterpieces from the Museum Collection.” I went there with my
twin brother because he had suggested I go see Mr. Steichen. It was a wonderful time, and it gave me the
idea that maybe I could spend my life making photographs.
AB: Why did you join the military? How did the experience inform your art?
JPW: I joined because it was my duty, especially during the Cold War. I enlisted to work as a photographer
because that’s what I do best. After that, I worked in different studios. I learned by working with different
photographers: fashion photographers, medical photographers and I worked in labs. My experience in
the service, if I could pin it down, made me appreciate the value and holiness of life because I was trained
in the concepts of destroying life.
AB: Your photos are hauntingly potent and morbid. Why the focus on social outcasts, people with unusual
physical capabilities or deformities, and mutilated corpses and amputated body parts?
JPW: OK, well, my photographs are not “morbid.” Morbid means unhealthy and deformed. I photograph
social outcasts because I want to celebrate their singularity and the strength it takes for them to engage life. An
example is a photograph called “Un Santo Oscuro,” a man born in Canada because his mother took thalidomide, which was banned in the United States under the Kennedy administration. He’s born without skin, and
without arms or legs. He’s in pain from the moment he was born. As a child, he was a sideshow freak. I had
a friend in L.A. who saw him begging on the sidewalk. My friend was overwhelmed. He told me about him
on the phone. I got on a plane to L.A., to convince this man to be photographed. I was very struck and emoPortrait: Joel Peter-Witkin, Self-Portrait (Reminiscent of Portrait as a Vanite.). All images courtesy Catherine Edelman Gallery.
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