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Media Information Media Release Summer 2017 20 October 2017 – 21 January 2018 ftmlondon.org/exhibitions #dahlwolfe The Fashion and Textile Museum, London, is pleased to announce the first-ever retrospective of the American photographer Louise Dahl-Wolfe to be held in the UK, opening 20th October 2017. A pioneer of modern fashion photography, the exhibition presents over 100 works highlighting how Dahl-Wolfe defined the image of the modern, independent woman. Twins at the Beach, Nassau, 1949. Photograph by Louise Dahl-Wolfe. Collection Staley Wise Gallery. ©Center for Creative Photography, Arizona Board of Regents. Louise Dahl-Wolfe (1895–1989) is one of the most important women photographers of the 20th century. Her work in the thirties, forties and fifties brought an informal and contemporary approach to fashion that had enormous influence on Richard Avedon, Irving Penn and the other great photographers who followed. A uniquely American artist, this is the first major survey of her work in the UK and is timed to coincide with a resurgence of interest in female photographers. The exhibition features over 100 photographs spanning three decades, from 1931 to 1959, and presents the work of couture designers Chanel, Balenciaga and Dior, as well as American fashion innovators Claire McCardell and Clare Potter. The exhibition will also present a significant body of portraiture by Dahl-Wolfe. These portraits capture literary figures such as W.H. Auden, Christopher Isherwood, Jean Cocteau, Edith Sitwell, Colette and Carson McCullers. She also documented fashion designers; and a major portfolio of Hollywood stars from Bette Davis, Orson Welles and Vivien Leigh in the 1930s to James Cagney and Veronica Lake in the 1940s. Louise Dahl-Wolfe worked with an exceptional range of models including Suzy Parker, Jean Patchett, Barbara Mullen, Mary Jane Russell and Evelyn Tripp. Louise Dahl-Wolfe 20 October 2017–28 January 2018 She helped to create distinctive looks for her models defining their professional lives and, arguably, creating the first generation of ‘supermodels’. In particular, her cover shoot for the March 1943 issue of Harper’s Bazaar is credited with discovering Lauren Bacall and leading to her film career in Hollywood. The exhibition considers the rise of fashion photography as a profession. As Louise Dahl-Wolfe noted, ‘there weren’t really fashion photographers, just artists like Steichen who just happened to do fashion photography.’ Dahl-Wolfe pioneered the use of colour and daylight in fashion photography, shooting on location and outdoors. She travelled to the then exotic locales of Tunisia, Cuba, South America, Spain and Mexico. Her work appears fresh and spontaneous but was always carefully planned. She also had an exceptional eye for colour and the exhibition will showcase rare, early tearsheets and covers that document her colour photography. Dahl-Wolfe came to fashion photography at a time when formal, sometimes stilted, European elegance was the norm and brought a modern vision that was relaxed, intimate and undeniably American. Combining Parisian couture with well-toned bodies, she infused magazine layouts with a refreshing natural wholesomeness that was nonetheless chic. Moreover, she captured a new sensibility in American fashion, showing clothes that were casual and comfortable and which reflected women’s increasingly active and independent lifestyles. A key focus of the exhibition is Dahl-Wolfe’s 22 years as the leading contributor to Harper’s Bazaar, from 1936 to 1958, working with editor Carmel Snow, legendary fashion director Diana Vreeland and the designer Alexey Brodovitch. ‘From the moment I saw her first colour photographs, I knew Bazaar was at last going to look the way I had instinctively wanted,’ declared editor Carmel Snow. The exhibition highlights Dahl-Wolfe’s prolific tenure at Harper’s Bazaar where she created 86 covers for the magazine, 600 colour plates, and over 2,000 black-and-white photographs. In addition, the Museum will stage a display of other photographers who have worked for Harper’s Bazaar from Baron de Meyer, Man Ray and Cecil Beaton to current contributors. Alongside fashion and portraiture Louise Dahl-Wolfe was also a documentary photographer. Her early work, taken in Nashville Tennessee, highlights black Americans, the poor and the dispossessed. These raw images of the American Depression present a fascinating contrast between Dahl-Wolfe’s personal interest and her commissioned glamorous work. Independent, witty and self-aware Louise Dahl-Wolfe is credited with both revitalizing the Hollywood portrait and invigorating fashion photography. Her legacy changed American visual culture and had enormous ramifications for the photographers who followed her. Louise Dahl-Wolfe did not so much embody the supremacy of American photography, she invented it. www.ftmlondon.org Page 2 of 5 Louise Dahl-Wolfe 20 October 2017–28 January 2018 Celia Joicey, Head of the Fashion and Textile Museum, says: ‘We are delighted to be the first museum in the UK to offer a retrospective exhibition on the work of Louise Dahl-Wolfe. Her fashion pictures are the definition of elegance and beauty. They present an aspirational portrait of the mid-century woman as she newly wished to be: independent, self- assured and in control of her own destiny. ‘Louise Dahl Wolfe: A Style of Her Own’ highlights the power of photography and magazines to change people’s perception of what they can do and who they might become. Terence Pepper, Photographs Curator for the Fashion and Textile Museum, says: “This long overdue show at last gives British audiences the opportunity to see the first career retrospective of the world’s leading woman fashion photographer. Dahl-Wolfe worked from the 1930s to the early 1960s and not only excelled at fashion but also triumphed as a still-life, nude and portrait photographer.” FOR FURTHER INFORMATION ABOUT THE EXHIBITION PLEASE CONTACT: Penny Sychrava on 0796 791 5339 or [email protected] Fashion and Textile Museum, 83 Bermondsey Street, London SE1 3XF T: 020 7407 8664 | E: [email protected] Notes to editors 1. ‘Louise Dahl Wolfe’ is at The Fashion and Textile Museum from 20 October 2017– 21 January 2018. 2. The Fashion and Textile Museum is at 83 Bermondsey Street, London SE1 3XF. For further information about FTM and its activities visit www.ftmlondon.org #dahlwolfe Fashion and Textile Museum @FashionTextile @FashionTextileMuseum FashionTextile 3. Museum opening times: Tuesday–Saturday, 11am–6pm; Sunday, 11am–5pm; Late night Thursday until 8pm; Last admission 45 minutes before closure. Ticket prices: £9.90 adults*, £7.70* concessions, £6 students and free entry for under 12s (*including Gift Aid). 4. The book LOUISE DAHL–WOLFE A Style of Her Own accompanies the exhibition. Published by La Fabrica ISBN: 978-84-16248-48-3. 5. The exhibition is accompanied by a learning programme which includes talks, events and workshops. For more details please see the Museum website. About Fashion and Textile Museum: The Fashion and Textile Museum is the only museum in the UK solely dedicated to showcasing developments in contemporary fashion, as well as providing inspiration, support and training for those working in the industry. Founded by iconic British designer www.ftmlondon.org Page 3 of 5 Louise Dahl-Wolfe 20 October 2017–28 January 2018 Zandra Rhodes in 2003, the museum is part of Newham College London – one of Europe’s largest further education colleges. Recent exhibitions at the Museum have included ‘Liberty in Fashion’, ‘Art Textiles’, ‘1920s Jazz Age Fashion & Photographs’ and the blockbuster ‘Missoni Art Colour’, which focused on the intersection of 20th century fine art, textiles and knitwear. About Louise Dahl-Wolfe Louise Emma Augusta Dahl (born in San Francisco, 1895; died in New Jersey, 1989), better known as Louise Dahl-Wolfe, was the youngest of three daughters of Norwegian immigrants. Growing up in San Francisco she began her studies at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1914. She studied design, composition, art history and colour theory, and took special courses in life drawing, painting, and anatomy over the next six years. Rudolph Schaeffer and Frank Van Sloun were her teachers. In 1915, she saw and was influenced by the World’s Fair in San Francisco, and in 1916 attended a performance by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. When her father died in 1919, she postponed her plans to study interior decoration in New York and started working as an electric sign designer. In 1921, she met the photographer Anne W. Brigman, who inspired her to take up photography. In 1923, Dahl moved to New York City to study interior decoration and design before returning to work in San Francisco at an interior decorating firm. But in 1926 she was involved in a car accident in which her mother was killed, and she left America to travel with her friend Consuelo Kanaga, a photographer for the San Francisco Chronicle. During her travels in Europe and Tunisia, she met the sculptor Meyer ‘Mike’ Wolfe, and married him in New York in 1928. They both helped and influenced each other’s careers; Wolfe later built and painted the backgrounds of many of his wife’s fashion photographs. In 1930, Dahl-Wolfe met Edward Weston and Dorothea Lange and became a professional photographer. The Dahl-Wolfes spent time in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, where she made an influential group of portraits of people living in poverty in the Great Smoky Mountains. One of the portraits, Mrs. Ramsey, 1931, was later published in the November 1933 issue of Vanity Fair by editor Frank Crowninshield. Several others were included in a group photography exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1937. In 1933, she and her husband moved to New York City, and in 1936 she became a staff photographer for Harper’s Bazaar, which would prove to be an incredible platform for her work. Over the next 22 years she produced portraits and fashion photographs, totalling 86 covers, as well as 600 colour pages and thousands of black-and-white portraits—her creativity was as vital as her productivity.
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