about her work: Whether she's photographing celebrities or primates, Greenberg lends her subjects iconic status. Her use of light and color exaggerates the figure while reducing it to its essence, capturing emotion in raw form.
beginnings: Jill Greenberg grew up in a suburb of Detroit, where she dabbled in painting, illustration, sculpture and photography since childhood. Prior to her undergraduate work at RISD, she attended RISD's Pre-College Summer Program, as well as a summer program in photography at Parson's in Paris. She credits her education at RISD for being instrumental in helping her to develop an intellectual approach to art. "I learned the language of talking about art as well as the visual language of images – how to communicate with pictures," she says.
evolution: After graduation Greenberg moved to NYC intent on building a commercial photography studio while assisting other commercial photographers and continuing her education at the School of Visual Arts. "I used to pound the pavement and drop my book off at magazines and record companies," she says. An early career break came when Time magazine hired her for a photo essay on serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, which led to other assignments photographing high-profile people.
making it: Now based in Los Angeles, where she lives with her husband and two young children, Greenberg lends her signature style to a wide range of clients, including Anheuser Busch, Burger King, Disney, Dow Jones, GQ, HBO, Paramount Pictures and Target. In 2002 she returned to fine art photography and began exhibiting new bodies of work at galleries in New York, Los Angeles, Boston and Toronto; two books have also emerged as a result of her renewed fine arts focus: Monkey Portraits (2006) and the limited edition Ursine (2007). In 2006 Greenberg attracted plenty of attention through her controversial End Times series, a collection of portraits of anguished, sobbing toddlers meant to capture a primal reaction to humanity's greatest fears.
discoveries: 1) "My opinions change all the time regarding what kind of art I want to make, and then I come back to thinking the same things I thought at RISD." 2) "I love making images that make me feel something – that I find beautiful. I do like other people to like them, but really I am making them for myself."
