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Coming into Fashion: A Century of Photography at Condé Nast

Today, fashion photographers are exhibited in the most prestigious museums. Their photographs are sold by galleries and auction houses for considerable prices, and each year publishers release new books dedicated to the best of the genre. Iconic images by Edward Steichen, Erwin Blumenfeld, Helmut Newton, Herb Ritts and many other fine practitioners have been exhibited extensively in solo and group shows.

The discovery of most of the biggest names in fashion photography can rightly be credited to the legendary publisher Condé Nast, as so many photographers’ careers were launched on the pages of his magazines – predominantly in his flagship, Vogue. During the past 100 years the publishing house has celebrated the world of fashion in all its spectacular incarnations. The first photographer hired by the company, in 1914, was Baron Adolphe de Meyer, followed in later decades by such luminaries as Edward Steichen, Man Ray, George Hoyningen-Huene, Horst P. Horst, Cecil Beaton and Erwin Blumenfeld. Since his earliest days as a publisher, Condé Nast was a gifted talent scout. By surrounding himself with great artists, he placed Vogue, in addition to his other magazines (most notably Vanity Fair and Glamour, as well as the foreign editions of Vogue), at the forefront of the photographic avantgarde. The Condé Nast studios in New York, Paris and London were laboratories of creativity, employing artists eager to capture and show off the gems of haute couture. Alexander Liberman, hired as Vogue’s art director in the early 1940s, kept pace with his talented image-makers. Such photographers as Irving Penn, William Klein, Helmut Newton and David Bailey were brought on board, and as with their predecessors from the inter-war period, their careers took shape and blossomed thanks to Condé Nast’s innovative and groundbreaking publications. This great tradition has carried through to present times. In New York, Paris, London, or Milan, Deborah Turbeville, Bruce Weber, Peter Lindbergh, Ellen Von Unwerth, Corinne Day, Mario Testino, Steven Meisel, Nick Knight, Tim Walker, Miles Aldridge, Sølve Sundsbø or Willy Vanderperre – to name a few – have likewise made their marks not only in fashion magazines but in the history of photography.

This exhibition, which brings together a selection of rare photographs and original magazines from the Condé Nast archives in New York, Paris, Milan and London, is the first project of this scope and magnitude to present early work by those who went on to become the biggest names in the history of fashion photography.

Specifics

Number of works:

160 prints and 100 original magazines

Venue list

August 18 - November 4 2012
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January 17 - April 7 2013
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City Art Centre, Edinburgh, UK
June 15 - September 8 2013
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Palais Galliera, Paris, France
March 1 - May 25 2014
Museum Bellerive, Zürich, Switzerland
July 11 - October 19 2014
Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, USA
November 11 2014 - February 22 2015
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Multimedia Art Museum, Moscow, Russia
March 27 - June 7 2015
Museo Franz Mayer, Mexico City, Mexico
July 29 - October 4 2015
October 22 2015 - February 7 2016
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Nexus Hall, Tokyo, Japan
March 18 - April 10 2016
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Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art Annex, Kyoto, Japan
April 22 - May 29 2016
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Huashan 1914 Creative Park, Taipei, Taiwan
September 15 - Novembre 27 2016
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July 29 - October 22 2017
Rockhampton Art Gallery, Queensland, Australia
July 29 - October 22 2017
The Arts Centre Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia
November 25 2017 - February 18 2018
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Contact

FEP
Foundation for the Exhibition of Photography
1650 West End Blvd. Suite 100
St. Louis Park, MN 55416
USA
T+1 612 961 1856
T+33 6 62 01 69 87
Einfo@fep-photo.org
FEP
Foundation for the Exhibition of Photography
57 Rue de la Roquette
75011 Paris
France
T+33 6 62 01 69 87
FEP
Foundation for the Exhibition of Photography
Avenue de la Rasude 2
1006 Lausanne
Switzerland
T+41 21 311 17 47
Einfo@fep-photo.org