Annie Leibovitz is the most famous and celebrated living photographer. Her original, witty pictures have been appearing on magazine covers for more than 30 years. Leibovitz was born on 2 October 1949 in Waterbury, Connecticut. Her father was a career official in the US Air Force and her childhood was spent on various military bases. While studying painting at the San Francisco Art Institute, she took night classes in photography, and in 1970 she began working for Rolling Stone magazine.

She became Rolling Stone's chief photographer in 1973 and, by the time she left the magazine 10 years later, she had shot 142 covers and published photographic reportages on numerous stories, including her memorable accounts of Richard Nixon’s resignation and the Rolling Stones’ tour of 1975. By the beginning of the eighties, Leibovitz was considered the leading rock-music photographer and an astute observer of the social scene.

When she started working with the recently relaunched Vanity Fair in 1983, she began broadening her areas of interest, helping establish Vanity Fair as a leading commentator on the worlds of entertainment and business.

In 1993, Leibovitz began working for Vogue. She shot portraits and covers, but she also began working with fashion, photographing couture collections. In addition to her editorial work, Leibovitz has shot a number of influential advertising campaigns, the most memorable of which were for American Express, the Gap, Givenchy, The Sopranos, Milk Board and many others. She has worked with numerous arts organisations, including the American Ballet Theatre, the Brooklyn Academy of Music and the Mark Morris Dance Group, and with Mikhail Baryshnikov.

Her excellent work has earned her many honours, including the Barnard College Medal of Distinction and the Infinity Award in Applied Photography from the International Center of Photography. She was awarded the title of Commandeur in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government in 2006. A year earlier, in a review of the 40 best magazine covers of the past 40 years by the American Society of Magazine Editors, Leibovitz was awarded both the first-place (the photograph of John Lennon and Yoko Ono taken for Rolling Stone the day Lennon was shot) and second-place (the pregnant Demi Moore for Vanity Fair) prizes. She was named a Living Legend by the Library of Congress.

She lives in New York with her three daughters, Sarah, Susan and Samuelle.