- 26
Man Ray 1890-1976
Description
- Man Ray
- MODEL IN SCHIAPARELLI GOWN REGARDING A NECKLACE
Provenance
Collection of Man Ray
Timothy Baum, New York, acquired from the above, late 1960s
Acquired by Margaret W. Weston from the above, 1999
Exhibited
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
Literature
Catalogue Note
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 20th 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).