Amanda Demme: Connections
July 24th, 2020
Amanda Demme’s photographic archive reads as a journey through contemporary culture. With sitters including iconic actors, creatives, activists and politicians, it would be easy to misinterpret her art as one of modern celebrity portrait photography. However, Demme approaches photography from a more illusive fine art perspective. Capturing an inner state and a personal story or journey, much like old master painters.
Her imagery illuminates the truth of her subjects through a deeper and personal understanding of their psychology. In this way, Demme is able to create a photographic portrait of the sitter combining both surface beauty with a self-reflexive analysis of human nature.
Tellingly Demme’s work is not created on assignment, her subjects are instead found through a waiting list of collectors and collaborators initiated in personal relationships. These sessions with Demme often lasting a full day, are removed from the busy large studio set-up. Rather her shoots are about a tightness and close bond forged through an intimate collaborative space. Marked by conversation, and the push and pull of shared ideas between photographer and subject, there are no rules of convention to follow - no pre-defined output to create.
Under Demme’s expert touch, photography is immediate, it is versatile and there is no better art form for capturing the depth of the modern human condition. As society becomes more disparate and isolated, her work finds an anchor through connection, forming an unbreakable emotional bond between artist, subject and viewer.
“It’s more about an emotional state. Each one of the characters is an extension of me. Abandonment. Loneliness. Isolation. Some things I feel every day.”
“I only want the honesty. I want to show people who they really are.”
About Amanda Demme
Amanda Scheer Demme is an American photographer and creative director. Previously a music supervisor, label owner, and artist manager, she is best known as a nightlife producer.
Demme was described by the Los Angeles Times as an "expert at 'building a room,” for her photography, “choosing a precise mix of guests, sculpting space with light and shadow, and cultivating a mood something akin to performance art." She conceptualised and shot the award-winning #theemptychair image for New York magazine's 2015 cover story "Bill Cosby: The Women."
She is available to hire for personal portrait series.