Madonna, 1979-1980

Lee Friedlander photographed Madonna years before her stardom, while she was struggling to form a band and supporting herself as a nude model. These photographs, produced in 1980, appeared in the September 1985 issue along with a second session with Martin H. Schreiber, who hired Madonna in 1979 to pose for his "Photographing the Nude" course at the New School in New York. Not unlike Tom Kelley's early photograph of the young Marilyn, these nudes, while not innocent, suggest an intensity in Madonna that would later be seen in her countless hits and her status as an icon from the 1980s onwards. Lee Friedlander is a highly celebrated fine art photographer.