Francesca Woodman

Francesca Woodman photographed herself as a child

Francesca Woodman was born in Denver, Colorado on 3 April 1958. Her parents were the painter and photographer George Woodman (1932-2017) and the ceramic artist Betty Woodman (1930-2018), whilst her older brother Charles later became a professor of electronic art. Francesca Woodman took an early interest in photography, the basics of which she learnt from her father, and took her first self-portrait at the age of 13. Self-portraits remained an important and central part of her artistic work until her early death. Her family frequently travelled to Italy during the summer months, where Francesca Woodman also attended school for a time and during her time at high school, she began to discover photography as an art form and to seriously explore the craft of photography. Woodman completed her studies in Rome, where she associated with numerous Italian intellectuals and artists and cultivated a fruitful exchange with them thanks to her fluent command of the Italian language.

The absence of success sent the artist into depression

After completing her studies, Francesca Woodman moved to New York City and sent portfolios of her work to various fashion photographers in an attempt to launch a career as a photographer. However, these applications came to nothing, which increasingly plunged the young artist into depression. After her relationship with her partner broke down, she attempted suicide and thereafter lived with her parents in Manhattan. She sought therapy and read the works of Marcel Proust (1871-1922). Despite all her efforts, however, she was unable to gain a foothold as a photographer, and her application for funding from the National Endowment for the Arts was unsuccessful.

Francesca Woodman died at the age of 22 on 19 January 1981, by jumping from the attic window of a building on the East Side of New York City.

Woodman became a feminist icon after her death

In her photographic work, Francesca Woodman was primarily concerned with herself and her body. The interpretation of her work has been and continues to be the subject of fierce debate among critics, but the recognition that eluded her during her lifetime has come to her posthumously in increasing measure. Most of her images are in black and white, and she often used double and long exposures. Francesca Woodman also made films on videotape to accompany her photographs, in which she compared, among other things, her own naked body with images of classical statues. She also produced several books, but only one was published during her lifetime: Some Disordered Interior Geometries, published in 1981 shortly before the artist's death, was only 24 pages long and based on an Italian geometry book, the pages of which she modified with photographs and correction fluid. Critics classified the work as "bizarre" and debate its significance to this day.