By: Sarah Zhong

Forty years after her death, a new exhibit opens at Marian Goodman Gallery in New York to showcase Francesca Woodman’s mysterious photographs.

Francesca Woodman first started photography because “she was interested in what photography as a medium does with time, disrupting the linear flow between the past, present, and future,” an article says. She started when she was 13, as she was sent to boarding school in 1972. Her father sent her a camera, and when she got to the boarding school, she began photography.

Francesca Woodman’s photography is very eccentric and strange; looking at her photographs is fun because it is like solving a riddle, but without an answer. For example, in one of her images taken in Rome, she is a mid-jump-a blur, with her hair soaring above her. “Look how high I can go, she seems to say, look how free I am,” a BBC article reads.

Woodman’s photos represent the emotional landscape of women, according to a WSJ article, as they show either her or female models in strange or dramatic poses. Many articles say her images “reveal a haunting look at femininity, otherness, and corporeity,” as stated in one of the articles.

Since Woodman’s photography is so abstract, many people will have different opinions about what they mean. Everyone can interpret each image differently. I think that’s the fun and unique part about it. You could ask a crowd of people what they think the pictures mean, and there would be many different answers.

Woodman’s photography is not straightforward like a math problem. There are many different and unique parts to her photographs. “I was inventing a language for people to see the everyday things that I also see and show them something different”– Francesca Woodman.

Woodman’s abstract photographs are fun to look at because they are riddle-like, a glimpse of history, and abstract. Now it’s time for you to have your very own interpretation. Visit the Marian Goodman Gallery Exhibit to try to solve the riddle– Francesca Woodman’s photography.