Man Ray 1890-1976

Collection of Man Ray

Timothy Baum, New York, acquired from the above, late 1960s

Acquired by Margaret W. Weston from the above, 1999

New York, International Center of Photography, Man Ray/Bazaar Years: A Fashion Retrospective, September - November 1990, and traveling to:

London, Barbican Art Gallery, January - April 1991

Madrid, Circulo de Bellas Artes, Madrid, May - June 1991

Frankfurt, Fotografie Forum, July - August 1991

Milan, Galleria Carla Sozzani, October - November 1991

Hong Kong Arts Centre, January 1992

Paris, Centre Georges Pompidou and the Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Man Ray, La Photographie à l'Envers, April - June 1998

Monterey Museum of Art, Passion and Precision: Photographs from the Collection of Margaret W. Weston, January - April 2003

The image offered here is an early example of Man Ray's fashion photography, a body of work that provided him not only with a source of income during his early years in Paris,  but also the inspiration for many of his most memorable images, including the great 'Noire et Blanche' (see Lot 16).   His introduction to the designer Paul Poiret in 1922 launched Man Ray into the world of haute couture and onto the pages of Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Vu.  To his work for Poiret, Chanel, Mainbocher, and Schiaparelli, among many others, he brought his customary talents for originality and surprise.  As Richard Avedon once told an interviewer, Man Ray was the artist responsible for 'breaking the stranglehold of reality on fashion photography' (quoted in Neil Baldwin, Man Ray, New York, 1988, p. 189).

The dress worn by the model in the present image has been attributed to Elsa Schiaparelli, the diminutive Italian-born designer who had worked for Poiret before opening her own boutique in Paris. She then went on to become one of the most celebrated designers of the 20^th century, noted for her bold designs using synthetic fabrics and bright colors, especially her favorite 'shocking pink.'  Man Ray met Schiaparelli when she lived in Greenwich Village in the later 1910s, and he photographed her clothes throughout his Paris years.  In 1934, he made a portrait of her wearing a close-fitting hat of her own design (reproduced in Timothy Baum, Man Ray's Paris Portraits: 1921-39, St. Petersburg, Florida, 1998, pl. 49).