Professionally I enjoy supporting friends, especially those
who are talented, honest and who have been particularly kind like Blanca
Bernheimer, a friend and colleague from a previous chapter in life. So last Wednesday I stopped by Trinity House Paintings, a London-New York based Impressionist and Modern Paintings gallery
for the opening of the show Beauty
Endures; Studies of Glamour and Intrigue that they are co-hosting with
Blanca’s much-celebrated Munich-based gallery Bernheimer Fine Art Photography.
The idea of the show was to bring the work of French painter
Paul
César Helleu (1859-1927) and contemporary German fashion photographer
Cathleen Naundorf (b. 1968) together for a side-by-side celebration of beauty,
glamour and haute couture.
Paul César Helleu was renown for his commissioned portraits of
high society including the Duchess of Marlborough and Helena Rubenstein and
whose fashionable drawings and ideas served as inspiration to a number of the
early 20th-century couturiers like Doucet, Charles Frederick Worth
and Coco Chanel. (On a slightly
unrelated note, it was Helleu who designed the marvelous star and zodiac
ceiling of NYC’s Grand Central Station).
Renowned Munich-based contemporary fashion photographed
Cathleen Naundorf frames some of the most amazing creations by today’s top
couturiers like Chanel, Dior, Gaultier, Lacroix and Valentino. Influenced by
colleagues from a previous generation like photographer Horst P. Horst and film
directors Visconti and Fellini, her b&w’s are amazing and her experimental color
photos transform a realistic but staged situation into something more like a fresco
in which the colors look to be flaking off a decaying palazzo wall.
The idea of pairing the two is formidable, as you can attest
by my coupling of selected images.
Although one could sensibly purchase both a drawing and a photo and hang
them together, each work of art holds it own and would be a wonderful addition
to any art collection.
From top to bottom:
Cathleen Naundorf | Nibelungen
IV | Chanel - HC winter | 1983 – no. 114 | Door Studios | Paris –
13.04.2010
Paul César Helleu | Le parfum
| charcoal and pastel on paper | 20 x 17 in. | 50.75 x 43.25 cm. | signed lower
left
Cathleen Naundorf | The Last
Sitting III | Elie Saab – HC winter 2011 | Grand Palais | Paris –
14.09.2011
Paul César Helleu | Portrait of
Madame Helleu | sanguine, black and white chalk on paper | 18 x 25 in. | 46
x 63.5 cm. | signed lower right
Cathleen Naundorf | Homage to
Horst P. Horst | Chanel – HC winter | 2006 – no. 58 | Appartement Coco
Chanel, rue Cambon | Paris – 27.05.2008
Paul César Helleu | Élégante á
la chaise lyre | crayon on paper | 28.75 x 20.5 in. | 73 x 52 cm | signed
lower right
image credits: (Naundorf) Bernheimer Fine Art Photography, Munich; (Helleu) Trinity House Paintings, London and New York.
The exhibition at Trinity House is at 24 East
64th Street and runs through 29 September 2012
To go to the blog's HOME page click here
click here to "like" me on
Facebook
0 comments:
Post a Comment