Portraits for Bloomberg Businessweek | The University of Notre Dame

Professor Marya Lieberman poses for a portrait in her lab in the Stepan Hall of Chemistry at the University of Notre Dame on Friday, Dec. 1, 2023. (Evan Cobb for Bloomberg Businessweek)

Portraits of professor Marya Lieberman

I recently photographed chemistry professor Marya Lieberman at her University of Notre Dame lab for a story in Bloomberg Businessweek (“How Sick Kids Got Contaminated Cancer Drugs”). Lieberman’s team developed a field test to detect whether the correct amount of active ingredient were present in the chemotherapy drugs they were testing.

Elevating editorial portraits

It was a privilege to spend time with the team from Bloomberg and also with Professor Lieberman, who was so gracious with her time and was willing to try multiple different looks for the portrait.

What eventually ran in the magazine was one of the first portraits that we made during our time together, but I enjoyed some of the later images more.

Layering in photography is one of my favorite compositional choices, and it was the portraits from the cold storage room where I was able to utilize this method most effectively.

Professor Marya Lieberman poses for a portrait in her lab in the Stepan Hall of Chemistry at the University of Notre Dame on Friday, Dec. 1, 2023. (Evan Cobb for Bloomberg Businessweek)

Professor Marya Lieberman poses for a portrait in her lab in the Stepan Hall of Chemistry at the University of Notre Dame on Friday, Dec. 1, 2023. (Evan Cobb for Bloomberg Businessweek)

Professor Marya Lieberman poses for a portrait in her lab in the Stepan Hall of Chemistry at the University of Notre Dame on Friday, Dec. 1, 2023. (Evan Cobb for Bloomberg Businessweek)