Lawrence Schiller

Marilyn 12, No. 17

1962

This is a black and white portrait of Marilyn Monroe with sparklers photographed by Lawrence Schiller in 1962. Edition 72/75 Lawrence Schiller only remembers the 60s in this way: Fa...

A photograph by Lawrence Schiller. “Barbra Streisand (in her hotel room)” is a figurative photograph, vintage silver gelatin photograph in black and white by American artist Lawrence Schiller. The artwork is signed on the verso. Lawrence Schiller only remembers the 60s in this way: Fast. As in: Blur. Which is, for those who lived through it, as accurate a description as one is likely to find about the decade that began with optimism and ended in chaos. It was ten years of turmoil and exploration. And through this turbulent and tumultuous decade, it often seemed that whenever a headline-making news event occurred, Lawrence Schiller was there. Schiller was not just lucky to be in the right place at the right time; he was prescient. He was there to cover the event, to add to it, to help us see it, to aid its meaning and its depth. "It was a time in which things happened awfully fast," Schiller says of the decade. "It was a wild, wild period; an uncontrolled period. I don’t think you had any sense of perspective in the 60s. You had to wait and look back at it, because it was a period in which things were happening that had no rhyme or reason to it. But by the end of the ‘60s I had covered so many stories, had so many magazine covers, I had somehow become part of that decade’s history. And I already had my eye on the future." When Lawrence Schiller got the assignment from the French magazine, Paris Match to photograph Marilyn Monroe on the 20th Century Fox set of Something’s Got to Give, he thought nothing of it. It wasn’t to be a private, studio shoot. He wasn’t going to set up lights, create backgrounds, or use a tripod. Just another assignment, he figured. Monroe by then was firmly established as a figment in the imagination of most young men. The orphan Norma Jean had recreated herself as the blonde bombshell Marilyn Monroe. She’d appeared in twenty-nine films by the time Schiller photographed her in black and white and color in May, 1962. The world was unprepared for the moment when Marilyn jumped in the swimming pool in a flesh-colored bikini and came up out of the water au natural. She was all smiles and in her element: the sex goddess...

George Platt Lynes Photograph #9 of dancer Francisco Moncion 1949. George Platt Lynes rare original vintage 1949 gelatin silver photograph of dancer Francisco Moncion. Stamped on verso - GEORGE PLATT LYNES. Photo is 7 3/4 x 9 1/2 inches, glossy finish in excellent condition. This photograph is #9 from a collection of 12 different poses in this series taken in Platt Lynes's NYC studio in 1949 (as per the NY Public Library archives). The cloud backdrop is recognizable in other Platt Lynes photographs. Moncion was a personal friend of Platt Lynes and this photograph is from Moncion's personal photographic collection. George Platt Lynes (1907–1955), was a gregarious American portrait, dance, fashion, and male nude photographer whose career spanned the late 1920s through the early 1950s. From age eighteen, Lynes entered the cosmopolitan world of the American expatriate community in Paris when he became acquainted with the salon of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas. He began photographing authors like Stein, Jean Cocteau, André Gide, and Colette and soon established himself as one of the premier fashion photographers in the Condé Nast stable, documenting the ballet companies of George Balanchine/Lincoln Kirstein, and pursuing a private obsession with seductive images of young male nudes rarely published in his lifetime. Platt Lynes photographs are in the collections of every major art museum and university archive including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, Yale Art Museum, and the Smithsonian. Francisco Moncion (July 6, 1918 – April 1, 1995) was a charter member of the New York City Ballet. Over the course of his forty year career, choreographers George Balanchine, and Jerome Robbins in the New York City Ballet created 22 major roles for Moncion including the Dark Angel in Orpheus, Death in La Valse, Prince Ivan in Firebird, and the Boy in Afternoon of a Faun. He was also a choreographer and a talented painter who exhibited alongside Miro, Picasso and Carrado Cagli. Moncion was a popular model for many famed mid-century (late 1930s, 1940s - 1950s) figure photographers including Platt Lynes, Carl van Vechten, Maurice Seymour...

George Platt Lynes Photograph #5 of dancer Francisco Moncion 1949. George Platt Lynes rare original vintage 1949 gelatin silver photograph of dancer Francisco Moncion. Stamped on verso - GEORGE PLATT LYNES. Photo is 7 3/4 x 9 1/2 inches, glossy finish in excellent condition. This photograph is Photograph #5 (similar to #4 but the head is tilted to the subject's right) from this rare collection of 12 different poses in the series taken in Platt Lynes's NYC studio in 1949. The cloud backdrop is recognizable in other Platt Lynes photographs. Moncion was a personal friend of Platt Lynes and this photograph is from Moncion personal photographic collection. George Platt Lynes (1907–1955), was a gregarious American portrait, dance, fashion, and male nude photographer whose career spanned the late 1920s through the early 1950s. From age eighteen, Lynes entered the cosmopolitan world of the American expatriate community in Paris when he became acquainted with the salon of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas. He began photographing authors like Stein, Jean Cocteau, André Gide, and Colette and soon established himself as one of the premier fashion photographers in the Condé Nast stable, documenting the ballet companies of George Balanchine/Lincoln Kirstein, and pursuing a private obsession with seductive images of young male nudes rarely published in his lifetime. Platt Lynes photographs are in the collections of every major art museum and university archive including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, Yale Art Museum, and the Smithsonian. Francisco Moncion (July 6, 1918 – April 1, 1995) was a charter member of the New York City Ballet. Over the course of his forty year career, choreographers George Balanchine, and Jerome Robbins in the New York City Ballet created 22 major roles for Moncion including the Dark Angel in Orpheus, Death in La Valse, Prince Ivan in Firebird, and the Boy in Afternoon of a Faun. He was also a choreographer and a talented painter who exhibited alongside Miro, Picasso and Carrado Cagli. Moncion was a popular model for many famed mid-century (late 1930s, 1940s - 1950s) figure photographers including Platt Lynes, Carl van Vechten, Maurice Seymour...