Annie Leibovitz has been a household name for as long as I can remember. From her famous images of the grittiness of America too images of celebrities like Lennon, Yoko, Divine, Warhol to her relationship with Susan Sontag. About 2 years ago her name switched for me from something of pictures to something more tangible, more real. I began working a job in her former residence in the West Village. Since the first day, as I was working, I couldn’t help but think about Annie and imagine her life in this house. I would always think, did Annie lay out her photographs across these stairs? Did she read books in this room or make love in this other room? How did she decorate these walls and how did it smell? Was there food being cooked? Fresh flowers? Incense burned? Which room was her studio that she painstakingly went over negatives and prints? At one point I used to look at her photographs with an artistic curiosity and now my new interest is following Annie’s ghost through this house and imagining what kind of world she created behind these brick walls. And sure, every now and again I look back at her photographs and admire them but now I have a new interest. I wonder who of these people, of her friends she photographed, are also a ghost in this house.
-Jen Fisher