A while back, Richard Avedon had a confession to make. “I hate cameras,” said the man who revolutionized fashion and portrait photography. “If I could only work with my eyes alone!”
Yet Avedon’s photos seem to do just that — they remove the distance the camera lens creates to make you feel that you are right there beside his subjects.
Born in New York City in 1923, Avedon had a stern father, an artistic mother and a beautiful, but troubled, sister. At 18, he wanted to be a poet. And the slight, 5’7” dreamer didn’t lack confidence — or a sense of drama. “I know my drifting will not prove a loss / For mine is a rolling stone that has gathered moss,” he wrote in 1941.
A year later, Avedon joined the Merchant Marines, where he spent his World War II years shooting ID photos of new recruits. “I must have taken pictures of 100,000 faces before it occurred to me I was becoming a photographer,” he later recalled.
After demobilization in 1944, Avedon shot fashion pictures for the tony Manhattan department store Bonwit Teller and studied with Alexey Brodovitch, the legendary art director of Harper’s Bazaar. By 1945, his work was appearing in Junior Bazaar.
“His first photographs for us were technically very bad,” Brodovitch later recalled. “But they were not snapshots. . . . Those first pictures of his had freshness and individuality, and they showed enthusiasm and a willingness to take chances.”
Who else was willing to take chances? Brodovitch and Carmel Snow, editor in chief of Harper’s Bazaar, who soon sent the young talent to fashion’s sacred capital, Paris.
The postwar years were hard in Paris. When Avedon first arrived there, in 1946, it was with an explicit directive from Snow. “Dick was tasked with this idea that he was there to rebuild Paris,” explains Martin. In restoring the energy and excitement around Paris, Avedon imbued it with some of his own.
Avedon’s models jumped, twirled, leapt over puddles and they smiled. Like Avedon himself, they rarely stood still. While he wasn’t the first to use action in fashion photography (in the 1930s, Martin Munkacsi and Toni Frissell began creating fashion images of women engaged in sporty scenarios), Avedon was the first to pair such vitality with women wearing couture.
Character and spirit became la mode. Dovima’s graceful silhouette juxtaposed against the wrinkled heft of two shackled elephants. Dorian Leigh laughing and embracing a bicycle racer. Suzy Parker roller skating across the Place de la Concorde. Sunny Harnett and her cool gaze just daring the roulette table — and every man in the room — not to do her bidding. There was always a narrative in an Avedon mise en scène — whether the background was elaborately staged or stark, the model’s job had forever changed from posing, to acting.
Of course, Avedon did not limit himself to fashion photography. The little boy who once collected autographs grew up to create the most iconic portraits of the 20th century, many of these were included in an exhibition at Guild Hall Museum in East Hampton, New York, in 2017.
A 1958 New Yorker profile noted that even though Avedon’s portraits immortalized cultural elites such as Truman Capote, Elsa Maxwell and Charles Laughton, the qualities that most interested the photographer were “advanced age, physical debility, ugliness, or the pathos underlying the surface insouciance.” Yet “none of Avedon’s subjects seem to resent this kind of treatment . . . being selected to sit for one of his Harper’s Bazaar portraits ranks as an accolade.”
Over the next 40-plus years of his career, his iconic portraiture never lost its force; although at times, his unvarnished truth felt cruel.
But Avedon was a creator, not an observer, and he made no apologies for this. The sitter and the photographer “have separate ambitions for the image,” he wrote in 1985. “His need to plead his case probably goes as deep as my need to plead mine, but the control is with me.”
Find original Richard Avedon photography on 1stDibs.
Diana Ross for Vogue - Vintage Photograph by Richard Avedon, 1970s
By Richard Avedon
Located in Roma, IT
An original vintage gelatin silver photograph depicting Diana Ross (b. 1944), photographed by the celebrated American fashion and portrait photographer Richard Avedon for Vogue magaz...
Photographic Paper
RICHARD AVEDON - CENTER FOR CREATIVE IMAGING
By Richard Avedon
Located in Portland, ME
Avedon, Richard. RICHARD AVEDON - CENTER FOR CREATIVE IMAGING. Poster, 1991. Signed in ink by Avedon. Captioned " Gordon Stevenson, drifter Interstate 90 Butte Montana...
Offset
Elise Daniels, Turban by Paulette, Le Pré-Catalan, Paris
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Signed by the photographer
Silver Gelatin
Price Upon Request
Suzy Parker and Gardner McKay (Dress by Balmain), Café Des Beaux-Arts, Paris
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Richard Avedon (1923-2004) Suzy Parker and Gardner McKay (Dress by Balmain), Café des Beaux-Arts, Paris, August 1956 1956/2001 Signed and numbered in pencil, verso Gelatin silver ...
Silver Gelatin
Elise Daniels, Turban by Paulette, Le Pré-Catelan, Paris
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Signed by the photographer on the verso
Silver Gelatin
Price Upon Request
Marlene Dietrich, Turban by Dior, The Ritz, Paris, 1955
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Signed by the photographer on the verso
Silver Gelatin
Twiggy, Hair by Ara Gallant, Paris Studio, January, 1968
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Signed by the photographer
Silver Gelatin
$2,853
H 21.26 in W 13.78 in D 0.08 in
Audrey- Signed limited edition fine art print, Sensual, Contemporary
By Ian Sanderson
Located in Sant Cugat del Vallès, Barcelona
Audrey - Signed limited edition archival pigment print , Edition of 5 This is an Archival Pigment print on fiber based paper ( Hahnemühle Photo Rag® Baryta 315 gsm , Acid-free and...
Archival Paper, Black and White, Giclée, Archival Pigment, Pigment, Phot...
Ted Higby at Skyline Rodeo, 1928
By Lora Webb Nichols
Located in New York, NY
Listing includes framing with UV plexiglas, free shipping and a 14 day return policy. Ted Higby at Skyline Rodeo, 1928 15 x 12 inch gelatin silver print Image Size: 14 x 8.5 inches Frame size: 22.5 x 17.5 x 2 inches Edition of 15 Lora Webb Nichols was born in 1883 and grew up in the small mining town of Encampment, Wyoming. At the age of 16 Lora received her first camera and from that moment and for the next few decades she produced work that is both stunning in its singular voice and revealing in the world it opens up for us. At first Nichols photographed her family, friends, and the landscape around Encampment, but when the town experienced a copper mining boom Nichols expanded her scope to become a photographer for hire shooting portraits and industrial photographs. When the boom collapsed, Nichols took the risk of opening her own business in Encampment - The Rocky Mountain Studio - which opened in 1925. The studio ran for ten years, accumulating 24,000 negatives that illustrate the lives and environment of the people living in and around the town while creating a distinctive and surprising body of work. If one was to attempt an analogy – Nichols’ pictures fit somewhere between Lartigue and Lange - joyful and generous while objectively intimate. In particular what seems to distinguish Nichols’ work is the way she sees the world from a female perspective. As Vince Aletti...
Silver Gelatin
$5,000
H 11 in W 14 in
Eve Babitz and Marcel Duchamp playing chess during Duchamp's Pasadena Art Museum
By Julian Wasser
Located in New York, NY
Listing is for an unframed print and includes free shipping to the continental US and 14-day return policy. Julian Wasser Eve Babitz and Marcel Duchamp pl...
Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin
Jaybirds
By Adam Jahiel
Located in Sante Fe, NM
For years, Jahiel has been photographing the cowboys of the Great Basin–perhaps one of the most inhospitable regions of the already rugged West. These people represent one of the l...
Silver Gelatin
Joan and Quintana Roo (Frame 27a.)
By Julian Wasser
Located in New York, NY
Listing includes free shipping for unframed prints and a 14 day return policy. Joan Didion by Julian Wasser 20 x 16 inch gelatin silver print Edition 3 of 15 Signed on verso by Julian Wasser *Please inquire for international shipments. Quotes will be provided at cost via FedEx. Description - Julian Wasser started his career in photography in the Washington DC bureau of the Associated Press where he met and accompanied the famous news photographer Weegee – who would become a lasting influence on him. In the mid-60s Wasser moved to Los Angeles as a contract photographer for TIME, LIFE, and FORTUNE magazines and becoming internationally known as the go to guy for getting candid but memorably composed photographs. (His iconic images of Jack Nicholson and Anjelica Huston; Marcel Duchamp and Eve Babitz; and a young Jodie Foster are already classics.) In 1968 TIME Magazine assigned Wasser to go to the home of the young writer Joan Didion whose book Slouching Towards Bethlehem was becoming a literary sensation. “I’d read her fiction,” said Wasser. “and she didn’t miss a thing. She was such a heavyweight person.” Wasser shot Didion at her rented house on Franklin Avenue in Hollywood, where she lived with her husband, the writer John Gregory Dunne, and their daughter, Quintana Roo. “It was a nice, cozy house,” Wasser remembers. “And she was a very easy person to talk to...
Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin
Untitled Portrait
By Seydou Keïta
Located in New York, NY
Listing includes framing with UV Plexi ($900 value), free shipping, and a 14-day return policy. Seydou Keïta Untitled Portrait, 1952 - 1955 (02158) 23...
Photographic Film, Photographic Paper, Silver Gelatin
$716Sale Price|20% Off
H 15.75 in W 11.75 in
Cecil Beaton, Audrey Hepburn, from Electa Editrice Portfolios, 1981 (after)
By Cecil Beaton
Located in Fairfield, CT
Artist: Cecil Beaton (1904–1980) (after) Title: Audrey Hepburn Year: 1981 Medium: Heliogravure on velin paper Paper Size: 15.75 x 11.75 inches (40.01 x 29.84 cm) Condition: Well pres...
Offset
$716Sale Price|20% Off
H 15.75 in W 11.75 in
Cecil Beaton, Buster Keaton, from Electa Editrice Portfolios, 1981 (after)
By Cecil Beaton
Located in Fairfield, CT
Artist: Cecil Beaton (1904–1980) (after) Title: Buster Keaton Year: 1981 Medium: Heliogravure on velin paper Paper Size: 15.75 x 11.75 inches (40.01 x 29.84 cm) Condition: Well prese...
Offset
$716Sale Price|20% Off
H 15.75 in W 11.75 in
Cecil Beaton, Marlon Brando, from Electa Editrice Portfolios, 1981 (after)
By Cecil Beaton
Located in Fairfield, CT
Artist: Cecil Beaton (1904–1980) (after) Title: Marlon Brando Year: 1981 Medium: Heliogravure on velin paper Paper Size: 15.75 x 11.75 inches (40.01 x 29.84 cm) Condition: Well prese...
Offset
$6,830
H 40 in W 30 in
Actress Gina Bellman (Limited Edition of 25) - 30x40 In - Celebrity Photography
By John Stoddart 1
Located in New York, NY
This iconic 1989 photograph features actress Gina Bellman posing on top of a column, accompanied by two monkeys. It was shot by celebrity and fashion phot...
Silver Gelatin
$2,800
H 17.25 in W 15 in D 1.5 in
Photographic print, hand signed and inscribed by Helen Frankenthaler, framed
By Helen Frankenthaler
Located in New York, NY
Helen Frankenthaler Hand signed and inscribed photograph, ca. 1987 Photograph printed on offset lithograph Hand signed and inscribed by Helen Frankenthaler on the front Frame Include...
Lithograph, Offset
Varanasi, India
By Pentti Sammallahti
Located in Sante Fe, NM
Pentti Sammallahti is a benchmark figure in contemporary Finnish photography. His works depict nature eroded and broken down by civilization, but he does not put man and the environm...
Silver Gelatin
River Lune, Cumbria, England
By Edward Ranney
Located in Sante Fe, NM
Edward Ranney is an internationally recognized photographer who has photographed the natural and man-altered landscape for over forty years. In 1980 Edward Ranney was awarded a grant from The Northern Arts Council of Great Britain to photograph throughout Cumbria, in Northern England, and to exhibit a selection of the resulting work at the Carlisle Museum and Art Gallery. The work extended into 1981, and the exhibition took place in 1982. This selection of photographs favors views of the open spaces of the hills, or fells, of Cumbria and Northumberland including Hadrian’s Wall, the fortified earthwork delimiting the northernmost Roman occupation of the British Isles. Born in 1942, educated at Yale University, internationally recognized landscape photographer Edward Ranney is the recipient of numerous awards and grants including NEA grants (1974 and 1982), a Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship (1977), and Fulbright Fellowships (1964 and 1993). His work is represented in public and private collections alike including The Museum of Modern Art, New York and San Francisco, The Museum of Fine Arts, Santa Fe and Houston, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and The Art Institute of Chicago. His photographic monographs...
Silver Gelatin
$2,500
H 32 in W 24 in
Richard Corman - Jean-Michel Basquiat 1984 print, hand signed numbered by Corman
By Richard Corman
Located in New York, NY
Richard Corman Jean-Michel Basquiat 1984 (Red), 2020 Offset lithograph poster on color archival pigment paper Signed and numbered 2/100 by Richard Corman in silver sharpie on the fro...
Archival Paper, Lithograph, Offset
$1,800
H 19 in W 14.25 in D 3.1 in
Dennis Hopper Photographs 1961-1967 Limited Edition Hand Signed Monograph in box
By Dennis Hopper
Located in New York, NY
Dennis Hopper Photographs 1961 - 1967 (Limited Edition Hand Signed), 2009 Hardcover Book in Clamshell Box. Hand Signed and numbered 1327/1500 Hand signed by Dennis Hopper on the colophon page. 19 × 14 1/4 × 3 1/10 inches This is the limited edition (signed and numbered) collector's edition, not to be confused with the later mass market edition. Hand signed, hardcover book in a clamshell box from an edition of 1500. 17.3 x 13 inches (book) 19 x 14 1/4 inches (box) 546 pages Accompanied by Certificate of Guarantee issued by Alpha 137 Gallery During the 1960s, Dennis Hopper (1936–2010) carried a camera everywhere—on film sets and locations, at parties, in diners, bars and galleries, driving on freeways, and walking in political marches. He photographed movie idols, pop stars, writers, artists, girlfriends, and complete strangers. Along the way he captured some of the most intriguing moments of his generation with a keen and intuitive eye. From a selection of photographs compiled by Hopper and gallerist Tony Shafrazi—more than a third of them previously unpublished—this Collector’s Edition distills the essence of Hopper’s prodigious photographic career, documenting the likes of Tina Turner in the studio, Andy Warhol at his first West Coast show, Paul Newman on set, and Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights March from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. In many ways this work is photography as film, a poignant narrative expressed through a series of stark images—early shots of Tijuana bullfights, LA happenings, and urban street scenes show an experimental freedom that would translate into the vivid cinematic imagery of Easy Rider and beyond. The images are accompanied by introductory essays from Tony Shafrazi and legendary West Coast art pioneer Walter Hopps, as well as an extensive biography by journalist Jessica Hundley. With excerpts from Victor Bockris’s interviews of Hopper’s famous subjects, friends, and family, this is an unprecedented exploration of the life and mind of one of America’s most fascinating personalities. CONTRIBUTORS The photographer Dennis Hopper (1936–2010) was an acclaimed artist, actor, screenwriter, and director who first impressed audiences with his performances in Rebel Without A Cause (1955) and Giant (1956). He changed the face of American cinema with Easy Rider (1969), which he cowrote, directed, and starred in. Hopper went on to act in hundreds of memorable films and television shows, including Apocalypse Now (1979), Blue Velvet (1986), Hoosiers (1986), True Romance (1993), Basquiat (1997), Elegy (2008), and the TV series Crash (2008). Hopper began painting as a child and started taking photos in 1961, after his then wife Brooke Hayward gave him a 35 mm Nikon camera for his birthday. His paintings and photography have been exhibited all over the world, including the recent retrospective, “Dennis Hopper and the New Hollywood” in Paris. Dennis Hopper passed away May 29, 2010, in Venice, CA. The contributing authors An Englishman who moved to New York in 1973 and became connected to Andy Warhol, the Factory, and Interview, Victor Bockris has written books on Lou Reed, Andy Warhol, Keith Richards, William S. Burroughs, Patti Smith, and Muhammad Ali. Walter Hopps (1933–2005) was one of the premier curators of 20th-century art. Cofounder of Los Angeles’s Ferus Gallery and director of the Pasadena Museum of Art, he was responsible for the first retrospectives of Kurt Schwitters, Joseph Cornell, and Marcel Duchamp. A key advocate of American Pop art, his 1962 survey “New Painting of Common Objects” was the first of its kind. After directing the Washington Gallery of Modern Art, he went on to build the Menil Collection museum in Houston and became its founding director in 1987. A filmmaker and frequently published art, music, and film journalist, Jessica Hundley has directed several documentaries and recently completed her second book, a biography of country-rock legend Gram Parsons...
Mixed Media, Lithograph, Offset
Sold
H 18.12 in W 13.98 in D 0.08 in
Bianca Jagger - Photograph by Richard Avedon - 1978
By Richard Avedon
Located in Roma, IT
Fine Duotone Photolithograph, printed in 1978. Medium weight - satin/matte finish. Excellent condition. Certificate of authenticity on rear.
Photographic Paper
"Friends in Deed"
By Richard Avedon
Located in Astoria, NY
Richard Avedon (American, 1923-2004), "Friends in Deed", Gelatin Silver Print, 1999, signed in ink and dated lower right, wood frame. Image: 9.75" H x 7.75" W; frame: 18" H x 15.5" W...
Silver Gelatin
Sold
H 9.73 in Dm 7.49 in
Marilyn Monroe for "Some Like It Hot, shooting", USA, 1958
By Richard Avedon
Located in Cologne, DE
Norma Jeane Mortenson or better known as Marilyn Monroe – iconic, beautiful and maybe the most known Hollywood Stars of the 20th century. Born and raised in Los Angeles, USA, she spe...
Black and White
The Beatles, Richard Avedon
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
This portfolio of four individual offset lithographs in color are from the first printing dating to 1967. It is the age and condition that makes this such a rare find, each print me...
Lithograph, Offset
The Beatles, Richard Avedon
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
This portfolio of four individual offset lithographs in color are from the first printing dating to 1967. It is the age and condition that makes this such a rare find, each print me...
Lithograph, Offset
The Beatles, Richard Avedon
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
This portfolio of four individual offset lithographs in color are from the first printing dating to 1967. It is the age and condition that makes this such a rare find, each print me...
Lithograph, Offset
The Beatles, Richard Avedon
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
This portfolio of four individual offset lithographs in color are from the first printing dating to 1967. It is the age and condition that makes this such a rare find, each print me...
Lithograph, Offset
Beatles Lithographs
By Richard Avedon
Located in Mount Pleasant, SC
Richard Avedon, Beatles Psychedelic Photograph (1967) on Linen, Set of 4, Printed for Stern Magazine/Germany. Image size is 21x29.
Lithograph
Beatles Lithographs
By Richard Avedon
Located in Mount Pleasant, SC
Richard Avedon, Beatles Psychedelic Photograph (1967) on Linen, Set of 4, Printed for Stern Magazine/Germany. Image size is 21x29.
Lithograph
The Beatles, Richard Avedon
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
This portfolio of four individual offset lithographs in color are from the first printing dating to 1967. It is the age and condition that makes this such a rare find, each print me...
Lithograph, Offset
Joe Babbington, Caterer
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Gelatin silver print (Edition of 50) Signed and numbered, verso This photograph is offered by ClampArt, located in New York City. Price includes matting and framing. Although Richard Avedon’s celebrated fashion photographs have graced the pages of Harper’s Bazaar, Vogue, and Life, the artist primarily referred to himself as a portrait photographer. Avedon’s fashion shots are profoundly dramatic and dynamic, often capturing the model in motion. Along with his own acquaintances and various ordinary people, Avedon took photographs of celebrities, politicians, and other public figures ranging from Bertrand...
Silver Gelatin
Dr. Lothar Kalinowski, Psychiatrist
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Gelatin silver print (Edition of 50) Signed and numbered, verso This photograph is offered by ClampArt, located in New York City. Price includes matting and framing. Although Richard Avedon’s celebrated fashion photographs have graced the pages of Harper’s Bazaar, Vogue, and Life, the artist primarily referred to himself as a portrait photographer. Avedon’s fashion shots are profoundly dramatic and dynamic, often capturing the model in motion. Along with his own acquaintances and various ordinary people, Avedon took photographs of celebrities, politicians, and other public figures ranging from Bertrand...
Silver Gelatin
The Beatles
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
This portfolio of four individual offset lithographs in color are from the first printing dating to 1967. It is the age and condition that makes this such a rare find, each print me...
Lithograph, Offset
The Beatles
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
This portfolio of four individual offset lithographs in color are from the first printing dating to 1967. It is the age and condition that makes this such a rare find, each print me...
Lithograph, Offset
The Beatles
By Richard Avedon
Located in New York, NY
Four offset lithographs from the original 1967 printing, created as a portfolio of 4, each measuring 26 ¾ x 18 ½ (68 x 47 cm), unframed, each copyrighted and designated as “limited F...
Lithograph, Offset