From London With Love: The King of Vogue
Photos by Maya Stoilova
My dearest artlings,
As I step outside, an old photograph clings to mind: Truman Capote, lounging on a rock above the ocean, a cigarette in hand. It’s the summer of 1949, and he’s living it up in Tangier. The photo also features his entourage, with fellow writer Jane Bowles hovering on his right. Capote spots his usual expression, smug and keen-eyed, as if to say, “I’m observing–and portraiting–everything you do.” And in that picture, he is observing none other than the photographer himself: Cecil Beaton.
Born here in London in 1904, Beaton became one of the world’s three greatest photographers – at least according to Capote. (The other two, if you must know, were Henri Cartier-Bresson and Richard Avedon). But he excelled across domains: costume design, stage decor, sketching, painting, and, of course, photography. To be photographed by Beaton meant to be somebody, a socialite, an heiress, an actress, a star. And a beautiful one, too.
It’s those exact beauties I’m about to see at the National Portrait Gallery. A new exhibition, “Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World,” has just opened, spotlighting Beaton’s contributions to fashion and portrait photography. Capote – and Beaton himself – might’ve scoffed at that. As the former observed, Cecil preferred to be remembered for his lesser-known talents, “a phenomenon quite common with persons who develop multiple gifts: they often prefer to rather slight the original one.” But that’s the thing about artists’ preferences: they’re hardly considered, much less posthumously.
With that thought, I pull my hood down to spare myself from the slanting rain and cross Trafalgar Square. The statue of Admiral Nelson towers on my right, hovering like my very own Jane Bowles. A brisk sprint up St Martin’s Place, and I’m climbing the stairs of the NPG, dripping. My energy conveys none of the sprezzatura of the women I’m about to see. But they didn’t brave London–by foot–in November, did they?
They check my purse–too small to hold anything dangerous, I joke–and that Fashionable World stretches out before me. Large portraits of ladies loom on either side, like lamassu, mythical creatures, flanking the entrance of an Assyrian temple. A step, and I’m inside Beaton’s “Gallery of Beauties,” first shown here in 1968. Glamorous portraits hang on the walls, presenting Sita Devi, Vivien Leigh, Lady Diana Cooper – and many others - in draping gowns. Behind them: foil, velvet, flowers. The textures are so luscious and palpable that they, too, seem to come alive.
Another room follows: “The Essence of Artifice.” Like many artists, Beaton wished to obscure his origins: “I don’t want people to know me as I really am,” he once said, “but as I am trying and pretending to be.” And, as the following works relay, who he pretended to be was King Cnut, the 11th-century ruler of the North Sea Empire; Elinor Glyn, the daring, semi-erotic Hollywood writer; and a Royal Air Force sympathiser, at war to take photos, not fight battles.
More rooms line up. “Boy Wonder” shows the influence of Sergei Diaghilev, impresario of the Ballets Russes, who inspired Beaton’s stage design. “In Arcadia” witnesses Beaton’s journey into the heart of aristocratic society; “King of Vogue” flaunts his best fashion photographs; and “The Glittering Prize” shows his crowning achievement, designing the sets and costumes for Audrey Hepburn’s My Fair Lady—the work which earned him his Oscar.
In my eyes, though, everything culminates in one photograph: Best Invitation of the Season, 1951. Nina de Voe, one of Beaton’s favourite models, stands before me in a Balmain gown. Her green satin bodice catches the light, and the red skirt folds around her feet, echoing the red and green upholstery and the flowers in the foreground. Nina glances down, as if sensing my gaze and letting it roam her body—almost like a lady looking away after catching someone’s eye at a ball. In this photograph, she is at once herself and every other woman Beaton’s photographed: refined, sensual, and entirely aware of being seen.
If you come to see them yourself, please drop by the gift shop—I might still be there, drying off.
Chicly saturated,
Maya