Cecil Beaton

Irving Penn (1917-2009), one of the undisputed masters of twentieth-century photography, is known for his iconic images of haute couture and still life, but also, and above all, for his magnificent portraits of the artists, writers and celebrities who marked the cultural landscape of their time.

Cecil Beaton (1904-1980), a photographer best known for his celebrity portraits, also worked as an illustrator and costume and set designer. He worked for Vogue and Vanity Fair for over forty years. He was the official photographer to the Royal Family in 1937 and to the Royal Air Force throughout the Second World War. The National Portrait Gallery in London devoted two major retrospectives to him, one in 1968 and the other in 2004.

This photograph was shown for the first time by Pinault Collection in 2015 during the exhibition "Irving Penn, Resonance", at Palazzo Grassi, Venice.