Beckman started her career photographing the punk scene in England and New York in the 70s and 80s and has continued without pause. Attending King Alfred School in Hampstead, an alternative establishment "where the emphasis, both academically and socially, is on discovering and maximising the potential of each child" she discovered art, and upon leaving at 17 she spent a year at St Martins School of Art, and then three years at London College of Communication studying photography.
She soon had a job shooting for music magazines such as
Melody Maker and
The Face, with a studio and darkroom in central London. Beckman moved permanently to New York in 1982 and continued her career, shooting for her UK clients as well as new ones in the US. Beckman's work has appeared on records for the major labels, and in magazines including Esquire Rolling Stone , Glamour, Italian Vogue, The Times, Newsweek, Jalouse , Mojo and others. Beckman says "The bands and the fans — I loved the music and the styles."
Beckman was very prolific from the beginning of her career; she was widely published and continues to photograph new bands and other subjects. Meeting like-minded and similarly-backgrounded Vivien Goldman led to a long-term friendship and productive working relationship.
Beckman describes herself as a documentary photographer ; she produces a lot of work on location, including the cover for Police album
Zenyattą Mondatta (taken in the middle of a forest in the Netherlands), but she is also a studio portrait photographer.
In August 2010 Beckman produced a new exhibition entitled "Archive of Attitude" at Arkitip's Project Space, Los Angeles, which included artifacts from Def Jam and which garnered a lot of press coverage.
That same month photographer [[Jill Furmanovsky]] chose Janette's Paul Weller and Pete Townsend as one of her personal favourite music photographs for an article with [[NME]]
Janette is the niece of Morris Beckman.