Individual Photographers & Professionals, Women Photographers, Portrait Photography - General & Miscellaneous, Portrait Photography - Rich & Famous, Celebrities - Pictorial Works

Lee Miller

Name: Lee Miller
Author: Richard Calvocoressi
ISBN: 9780500542606

by Richard Calvocoressi

Write a review

Overview

"In the late 1920s, Lee Miller, already a legendary fashion model, left the United States to study photography in Paris. Here she became the disciple and lover of Man Ray, and rapidly developed into a witty surrealist photographer. She was soon taking on both portrait and fashion assignments for Vogue and running her own studio, first in Paris and later in New York. The Second World War saw her as Vogue's war correspondent: she covered not only the siege of St Malo and the liberation of Paris, but was also present with her camera when the US Army entered Dachau concentration camp. Her later years were spent in London with her husband, the painter, writer and collector, Roland Penrose, and at their Sussex home, Farley Farm." During her extraordinary life, Lee Miller came into contact with an astonishing range of people including painters, sculptors, actors, writers, musicians, fashion designers and socialites. Many of these became her friends and also the subject of her penetrating portraits. The finest of these photographs, two-thirds of which are either unpublished or have not been seen in print for over fifty years, are collected together here for the first time. They include not only highly perceptive and sympathetic studies of Pablo Picasso, Max Ernst, Dora Maar, Igor Stravinsky, Henry Moore, Colette, Marlene Dietrich, Fred Astaire and others, but also pictures of unsung individuals engaged in war work. Most memorable of all are Miller's pictures of victims and perpetrators of Nazi oppression - some of the most powerful images from the last century.

Reviews

There are no reviews yet. Log in to write one.

Editorials

Publishers Weekly

This collection of over 150 photographs chronicles the model-turned-freelance photographer's distinctive 30-year career, from her beginnings as a portraitist with Man Ray, through her long association with Vogue magazine. Two-thirds of Miller's oeuvre consists of portraits; while most here are of famous artists and writers (Reni Magritte, Pablo Picasso, Ivy Compton-Burnette), the most arresting portraits come from her work as a WWII photoreporter for Vogue (at the time, Vogue was one of the leading publications for war coverage). Miller's frontal-view compositions reveal her frank and unflinching attitude toward the world around her; the disturbing close-ups of female collaborators in Paris and the smashed nose of an SS prison guard in Buchenwald repel even as they compel. Calvocoressi, the director of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh, introduces the book, suggesting that the "ability to elicit feelings of disgust and sympathy at the same time is arguably what makes Miller and other war photographers... great artists." Her greatest accomplishments, Calvocoressi maintains, are her portraits of Picasso, which were produced over a 20-year period; she catches the artist, Calvocoressi writes, "absorbed in some activity, unselfconscious rather than posing." Gathered for the first time in this collection, Miller's work deserves a studied glance. 157 b&w illus. (Nov. 25) Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

In words and pictures, this volume chronicles the fascinating life of Lee Miller (1907-77), a dynamic American photographer who began her career in 1927 as a Cond Nast model. After moving to Paris to study art, she became the assistant to surrealist artist Man Ray and a serious portraitist in her own right, working with such iconic personalities as Pablo Picasso, Dylan Thomas, and Igor Stravinsky. Miller made the remarkable jump from portrait and fashion photography to photojournalism as a foreign war correspondent in Europe for Vogue magazine in 1942, where she made some of the most compelling images of World War II, including the liberation of Buchenwald and Dachau concentration camps. Calvocoressi, director of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh and author of Magritte, has written a revealing introduction to each chapter, and his insightful essay connects Miller's unconventional life to her photographs-beautifully reproduced as 157 lush black-and-white duotones, many of which have been unpublished until now. Little else is available on Miller's life and work. Highly recommended for all collections, especially academic libraries.-Shauna Frischkorn, Millersville Univ., PA Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.