We first saw these images of babies crying at a tucked away gallery in LA.
The collection, entitled End Times, is finally available in hardcover.

Very controversial, as critics claimed that photographer Jill Greenberg made these babies cry for the photos.

Sorry to disappoint the naysayers, but I have actually seen the boxes and boxes of contact sheets of photos of the babies that didn’t cry.
OK, here is a fact: babies cry.
Tired, hungry, wet, dry, angry, in pain, getting attention.
Many, many things will make them cry. As a parent I know this first hand.
OK, enough on that front.
The unique lighting and post on these photos blew the minds of photographers all over the place.
The quality of the skin, the way the tears fell down the cheeks, the intensely crafted, emotional portraits using only a seamless as a backdrop, seemed to reinvent what was possible with lighting.

So much so, that everyone jumped on the bandwagon and tried to rip her off.
I’m not going to go with the “homage” line, nor any claim that they had seen this before.
If you google her name, you’ll see pages of people willing to teach the “Jill Greenberg effect”.
Really?
Now, no one has time to chase down every imitator, but this is a photographic travesty.

To all of the imitators, stop it. Figure out your own style. And to the art buyers who engage the rip off photographers, shame on you.

OK, back to the book.
From the Amazon write up:

Pictures of crying children are viscerally upsetting. As photographer Jill Greenberg says, “there is something instinctive that makes you want to protect them.” End Times consists of 32 individual photographic portraits of young children crying, originally made by Greenberg in 2005 as a direct response to the policies of the Bush administration. Greenberg took her inspiration from an essay written by Bill Moyers titled “There Is No Tomorrow,” which discusses the negative influence of religious fundamentalists on American politics, in particular on environmental policy, foreign policy, gay marriage, stem cell research and abortion. She interspersed her highly saturated color portraits with reproductions of contemporaneous newspaper headlines, and gave the portraits titles that expressed her apocalyptic vision of Bush-era America, such as “Armageddon,” “Misinformation,” “Angry Country” and “Torture.” Needless to say, the controversy surrounding the release of these images in 2006 was colossal, erupting into a firestorm of debate that re-ignites nearly every time the work is exhibited. This volume gathers Greenberg’s series for the first time. At once discomfiting and quirky, unreal and heart-stopping, End Times is a howl of helplessness and condemnation.

Whether you see this as a political statement, or simply as amazing photographs, this is a long awaited collection we are happy to see.

Years ago, Jill Greenberg published this as an award winning, catalog in a small 4×6, soft cover format, in conjunction with a solo show in LA. This publication puts a crowning touch on the collection of her other books including, Monkeys, Bears, and Horses.
Collect the whole set.

Well spoken, sometimes outrageous, provocative Jill Greenberg should be in your home.
On your bookshelf or your wall.

She is represented by:
ClampArt
531 W 25th St
New York, NY 10001
(646) 230-0020

O’Born Contemporary
131 Ossington Avenue,
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M6J 2Z6
t 416 413 9555
[email protected]
www.oborncontemporary.com

Jaski Art Gallery
Nieuwe Spiegelstraat 29
1017 DB Amsterdam
Tel: +31-(0)20-6203939
Fax: +31-(0)20-6203069
E-mail: mailto:[email protected]