The Countesse de Castiglione, 1863-66
September 16, 2006 is the last day New Yorkers can view highlights from the late Richard Avedon's amazing photograph collection.
The oldest and most significant photos on display are those by Pierre-Louis Pierson of the Countess de Castiglione. Avedon had what was considered by many to be the most important collection of her portraits in private hands. Indeed, the small photographs on display were once owned by Christian Bérard, who mounted the photographs into a black album and then surrounded them by his own drawings and writings. Beyond their beauty, these portraits provide the fashion historian with a clear example of how the skirts in the early 1860s were beginning to form a teardrop imprint, foreshadowing the bustle periods of later decades.
As if these photos aren't reason enough to go see the show, there are also photographs by Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Irving Penn, Diane Arbus and Brassaï. It took my breath away to be able to inspect Baron Adolphe de Meyer's stylized signature penciled below his portrait of the Marchesa Luisa Casati. Many times I have seen his name reprinted in early Vogues, but to see it in real life....
Info:
“Eye of the Beholder: Photographs from the Richard Avedon Collection”
Pace/MacGill Gallery
32 East 57th St., 2nd floor
212.759.7999
Ends September 16th!!! Go!
Sarah Scaturro
Fashion Projects #5 is devoted to fashion curation, examining the meteoritic rise in relevance of fashion exhibitions.
It features interviews with an eclectic assortment of leading practitioners from different corners of the world. The issue includes long Q&As with Harold Koda, the longtime, recently retired curator of the Met’s Costume Institute, as well as the Museum at FIT’s veteran leader Valerie Steele. It also features interviews with curators in Antwerp (the ModeMuseum’s Kaat Debo), Toronto (Royal Ontario Museum’s Alexandra Palmer) and Venice (Maria Luisa Frisa); academics studying the field (Hazel Clark, Annamari Vänskä, and Alistair O’Neill); and, giving an on-the-ground perspective, the Met’s head conservator, Sarah Scaturro. The issue’s cover stars Greer Lankton’s sculptural representation of legendary Vogue editor and Costume Institute doyenne Diana Vreeland, who continues to loom over the field years after her death.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Showmanship and History: An Interview with Harold Koda by Francesca Granata
Woman of Steele: An Interview with Valerie Steele by Lisa Santandrea
Exploring Fashion’s Openness: An Interview with Kaat Debo by Alex Esculapio
London, After a Fashion Curator: An Interview with Alistair O’Neill by Alexis Romano
Curation and Conservation: An Interview with Sarah Scaturro by Mae Colburn
Reflections on Fashion Curating
An Interview with Hazel Clark and Annamari Vänskä
Fashion in the Vast Museum: An Interview with Alexandra Palmer by Ingrid Mida
Restless Curating: An Interview with Maria Luisa Frisa by Marco Pecorari