Lee Miller: From Vogue Model to War Photographer
The Victoria and Albert Museum, London, organized a retrospective of Lee Miller's photography at the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris, from October 21, 2008 to January 4, 2009. Born in 1907 in Poughkeepsie, New York, Miller began as a model for Vogue after meeting Condé Nast in 1927, posing for Edward Steichen. She pursued Man Ray in Paris in 1929, becoming his student, collaborator, and lover; together they discovered solarization. Miller opened her own studio, shooting fashion for Vogue and surrealist works like Exploding Hand. After a solo show at Julien Levy Gallery in New York, she married and moved to Cairo, producing images such as Portrait of Space. During WWII, she documented the Blitz in London, then became a war correspondent for Vogue, covering the front in Saint-Malo, Paris, Alsace, and Germany. She photographed the liberation of Buchenwald and Dachau, capturing images like Murdered Prison Guard. Post-war, she struggled with PTSD and largely stopped photographing, though she made portraits of friends like Picasso and Saul Steinberg. The article by Carolyn Burke, published in art press n°349 (October 2008), traces Miller's trajectory from model to innovative photojournalist.
Key facts
- Exhibition at Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris, from October 21, 2008 to January 4, 2009.
- Organized by the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
- Lee Miller was born in 1907 in Poughkeepsie, New York.
- She became a model for Vogue in 1927 after meeting Condé Nast.
- She worked with Man Ray in Paris from 1929, co-discovering solarization.
- Miller had a solo exhibition at Julien Levy Gallery in New York.
- She documented the Blitz and became a war correspondent for Vogue.
- She photographed the liberation of Buchenwald and Dachau.
Entities
Artists
- Lee Miller
- Edward Steichen
- Man Ray
- André Breton
- Roland Penrose
- Paul Éluard
- Nush
- Max Ernst
- Leonora Carrington
- Ady Fidelin
- Pablo Picasso
- Henri Cartier-Bresson
- Saul Steinberg
- Tanja Ramm
- Mary Taylor
- Hoyningen-Huene
- Carolyn Burke
- Mario Amaya
- Amy Lyford
- Michel Nuridsany
- Carol Squiers
- Jacques Demarcq
- Cecil Beaton
- Nimet Eloui Bey
- Berenice Abbott
- Charlie Chaplin
- David E. Scherman
- Zanele Muholi
- Hannah Starkey
- Tina Barney
- Oskar Kokoschka
- Anna Müller
- Jean Cocteau
- Margaret Bourke-White
- Thérèse Bonney
- Dora Maar
- Dorothea Tanning
- Theodore Miller
- Antony Penrose
- René Magritte
- Paul Delvaux
- Yves Tanguy
- Georges Lepape
- Éli Lotar
- Germaine Krull
- Jacques-André Boiffard
- Florence Henri
- André Kertész
- Nusch Éluard
- Adrienne Fidelin
- Martha Gellhorn
- Helen Kirkpatrick
- Fanny Schulmann
- Ellen Kuras
- Kate Winslet
- Michel Gondry
- Condé Montrose Nast
- George Gershwin
- Fred Astaire
- Audrey Withers
- Ernestine Carter
- Edward R. Murrow
- Regina Lisso
- Elizabeth Cowell
- Digby Morton
- Henri Matisse
- George Hoyningen-Huene
- Arnold Genthe
- Marcel Duchamp
- Grete Stern
- John Miller
- Erik Miller
- Florence MacDonald
- Alfred de Liagre
- Argylle
- Frank Crowninshield
- Madame Kochashinski
- Picasso
Institutions
- Victoria and Albert Museum
- Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume
- Vogue
- Julien Levy Gallery
- Royal Navy
- Paquin
- art press
- Art in America
- History of Photography
- New York Review of Books
- Autrement
- Nrf
- Tate Britain
- Lee Miller Studios Inc.
- British Vogue
- Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Lee Miller Archives
- Aesthetica Magazine
- Man Ray Trust
- Jeu de Paume
- Connaissance des Arts
- London Bulletin
- Julien Levy gallery
- Life
- Lund Humphries
- Scribners
- Vanity Fair
- Condé Nast
- Thames & Hudson
- De Laval Separator Company
- Broadway Theatre
- Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Bauhaus
- Beaux Arts Magazine
Locations
- Poughkeepsie
- New York
- Paris
- London
- Cairo
- Egypt
- Mougins
- Saint-Malo
- Loire
- Alsace
- Germany
- Buchenwald
- Dachau
- United States
- France
- United Kingdom
- USA
- Syria
- Romania
- Siwa
- Al Bulwayeb
- Chicago
- East Sussex
- England
- Chiddingly
- Manhattan
- Siwa oasis
- Al-bulwayeb
- Biarritz
- New York City
- Munich
- Normandy
- Bricqueville
- Rennes
- Leipzig
- Berlin
- Farley Farm House
- Sussex
- Île Sainte-Marguerite
- Albany
- Brooklyn
- Poland
- Canada
- Farley Farm
- Downshire Hill
- Al Bulwayed