Narrator

This photograph features a rear-screen projection, a filmmaking technique from the 1950s and 60s often used to shoot driving scenes or other forms of motion against a distant background.
Lucy Gallun.

Lucy Gallun

Sherman works alone in her studio. She has no assistants helping her as she prepares the makeup, her hair, the costume, the props, the set.

In this work, Sherman has projected an image as the backdrop of the shot. The rear-screen projection allowed her to place the character in a set in the same way that characters might be filmed in a studio in the film industry, and then put into a scene.

In this case, the character appears to be in a bar. We see the neon logos of beer companies behind her on the window. And also, the iron arches of lofts in lower Manhattan. So this character might be an artist.

Sherman has to get the focus just right, so that the backdrop is in focus and the character is also in focus. So there’s this smoky, hazy quality of the backdrop. Which again, reminds us that they’re projections.