A Fine Eye For Detail 2
December, 1991
By Nancy Bartels
Senior Editor, Confetti
...and a copywriter with the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper, sharpened her eye for detail even more.
This happy confluence of history, talent, and environment has sent Schneider's work in a variety of directions. She has done some advertising work, but more of her commercial photos have an editorial focus. She has shot cover photos for numerous books for Random House, Berkley Publishing, Little Brown, Warner Books, and others. Her project for Simon and Schuster, Mary Higgins Clark's Loves Music, Loves to Dance was number one on the New York Times bestseller list.
Her work has also appeared in Victoria, New Orleans, and Literary Guild Magazine. In addition, her fine art photography has been shown in New Orleans, New York, Munich and Basel, Switzerland.
From the beginning of her love affair with the camera, Schneider missed the smell and feel of oil paint, so she began painting her photographs. Rather than use the traditional method of applying color and then wiping it off again to leave a "tint," Schneider builds up layers of paint to achieve a rich and subtle color. Her media includes a variety of oils. She intimates that "my brushes and my fingers" are my most useful tools. She also uses various kinds of filters and grainy films to achieve the distinctive misty appearance of many of her photos.
When asked about any messages in her photos, Schneider says, "If there is any specific message in my work, it is not intentional. I'm looking for a balance of composition, but it's more an intuitive than a cognitive thing. I see something and my heart starts to flutter. There's something about a particular image or moment that just gets to me, and I think, 'That's it.' I just feel it. "Of course, everyone's work is somewhat autobiographical. I don't think you can do anything that doesn't reflect something inside of you."
In Schneider's case, her life in the Old South and her early immersion in antiques is evident in her work.