Marcus Leatherdale. Larissa, Issey Miyake, 1983.
Hailing from Montreal, photographer Marcus Leatherdale remembers paging through Interview magazine and coming upon a photograph that spoke to his soul. “The picture of Edwige with blonde hair sitting on a couch was the epitome of where and what I wanted to be and do in New York,” he says.
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In spring 1978, Leatherdale, then 25 years old, finally arrived in New York after completing his photographic training at the San Francisco Art Institute. Though SFAI didn’t focus on studio photography at the time, the young punk was determined to pursue his dream, beginning his practice by placing people in front of walls to simulate a controlled environment.
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“I didn’t realize I was archiving an era that was going to be extinct; I was just photographing my friends,” Leatherdale says, reflecting on the release of his magnificent monograph, Out of the Shadows—Marcus Leatherdale: Photographs New York City 1980-1992. Leatherdale’s timeless black and white portraits of icons including Robert Mapplethorpe, Andy Warhol, Madonna, Iman, Suzanne Bartsch, Debbie Harry, Joey Arias, and Kathy Acker offer an elegiac epitaph to Downtown at its height.
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Marcus Leatherdale. Tina Chow, Issey Miyake, 1983.