© Elizabeth Renstrom
Since Ryan McGinley and Tim Barber shaped VICE Magazine's photographic vision in the early 2000's, the magazine has had a consistent reputation for showing exciting new photography. Its relentlessly defiant content, ranging from controversial editorial stories to the often coveted annual Photo Issue, has carved out a recognizable, heavily copied aesthetic, trickling into mainstream fashion, lifestyle and advertising campaigns. Aside from their proclaimed hard-edged journalism, it's likely that this vision helped make VICE the media giant it is today. In 2013, before things could get stale, Matthew Lefheit took the reins for a brief but impactful stint. Under his tenure, Leifheit opened VICE's scope to photographers like Michael Bühler Rose, Erin O' Keefe, Lucas Blalock, and Rachel Stern, who are as equally engaged with photography's academic history as they are in keeping it current.
As Leifheit recently headed to Yale to pursue his MFA, Elizabeth Renstrom has taken over, promising to keep VICE's photographic spirit courageous. Renstrom, a former Parsons' student of George Pitts is an accomplished photographer and photo producer, and regularly shoots for clients like Refinery 29, TIME, Nylon, and Bloomberg Business Week while still somehow managing to find the time to make her own work, including a hilariously poignant ongoing series about her early adolescence in the 1990's. Just as her first issue came out of production, we caught up with Renstrom to hear more about her plans for VICE, her own work, and what's changing in photography today.
