Didn’t W.C. Fields say that you should never work with children or animals? Jill Greenberg has been immensely successful working with both. Her photographs of monkeys, bears and children are beautifully hyper-real and at the same time, extremely artificial. As far as I understand, this is largely done with lighting effects and post production digital enhancement. I’m rather partial to her series entitled Monkey Portraits, a weirdly touching study of the facial expressions of monkeys and apes. Awww, they think they’re people. Apparently, Jane Goodall is a big fan. Greenberg clearly enjoys the contrast of posing natural subjects in manufactured environments. Augmenting this sense of unreality, the animals used in Monkey Portraits were all trained “working monkeys” routinely used in film, television and advertising and well accustomed to mugging for the camera. That’s right, Ross’s monkey Marcel from Friends is featured. Greenberg also used trained show business bears for her Ursine series.
The work which has garnered the most attention is End Times, a collection of high gloss portraits of tearful children. I don’t know why, but something about it is really hilarious. Greenberg admitted that she elicited tears from her small models by giving them lollipops and then abruptly snatching them away. Infant coddling Americans were immediately outraged. The blogosphere erupted in scorn and accusation. The term “child abuse” was bandied about quite a lot. Why won’t anyone ever think of the children? I don't get what the big deal was. They eventually got their candy back. God, don’t you just hate bloggers?
Galleries: Monkey Portraits, Ursine and End Times
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