•ARG HIVE-
RI ichard Avedon's first published photographs—adver-
Itisements for New York's Bonwit Teller department store—
appeared in Vogue in late 1944 and 1945. From that one client
and that one important magazine, his commercial reputation
(and income) quickly soared. Avedon's success has additional
significance when viewed against the work of others whose
photographs also appeared in the ad pages of Vogue, such as
Gjon Mili, George Hoyningen-Huene, and George Platt Lynes,
whose art images are part of the canon but whose commercial
work has been lost. Similarly, advertising work by Horst P. Horst,
Erwin Blumenfeld, and Diane and Allan Arbus, all featured in
Vogue, is often talked about, but rarely seen.
SHOT OUT OF THAdvertising Photography in
Each issue of Vogue opened with several dozen pages of ads;
nearly the same number of editorial pages followed; a back
section printed ads and text side by side. In effect, at midcentury
(from the 1930s to the 1950s) Vogue published two magazines
back to back: the first was filled with pictures of dresses, shoes,
coats, furs, stockings, makeup, and even cars you could buy. The
following pages showed new fashions from Paris and New York,
alongside articles on beauty, travel, art, and good living. (The ratio
has changed in the intervening years: according to the marketing
firm Fast Horse, of the September 2011 Vogue's 758 pages, 584
were ads—that is, around 75 percent of the issue.)
Given the importance that magazines played in the history of
twentieth-century photography, it is remarkable how little we know
about these ad images. Before the 1970s, modernist art history's
proscriptions kept anything commercial or colorful out of the canon
(for many years color photography was closely associated with
commerce). Today's liberal art marketplace has made nearly all
photographs valuable—as long they can hang on a wall. But the
ephemeral nature of magazine advertisements, which appeared
only on the printed page, makes them unreliable exhibition material,
with little value to dealers and collectors. Historians of photography
have to scramble for sources: until the late twentieth century.
Magazine, 1930s-1950sphotographers suppressed attention to their commercial efforts,
believing that only unpaid, personal work had lasting value.^
Yet from a practical point of view, commercial photographs are the
most important of all, because they pay for everything else. In 1960,
cultural historian Raymond Williams called advertising "the official
art of modern capitalist society. . . . It commands the services of
perhaps the largest organized body of writers and artists, with their
attendant managers and advisers, in the whole society."^
Among those "managers and advisers" were the many art directors
who wielded influence throughout the magazine industry. None had
more power than Alexander Liberman, who learned his trade in
Paris in the 1920s and '30s at Vu magazine, pioneering journal of
the illustrated press, then started at Vogue in 1941, was appointed
art director in 1943, and would serve as editorial director of Conde
Nastfrom 1962 until his retirement in 1994. During his long tenure,
THIS PAGE: Riciiard Avedon, advertisement for Swansdown, Vogue,
September 1 , 1955; OPPOSITE, CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT:
Richard Avedon, advertisement for Warner's corselettes. Vogue,
August 1 ,1956 ; John Rawlings, advertisement for Enka Rayon, Vogue,
February 1 , 1 9 5 1 ; George Platt Lynes, advertisement for Henri Bendel,
Vogue, September 1 , 1948; Richard Avedon, advertisement for
Miron Woolens, Vogue, August 1 5 , 1 9 5 3 .
62 / www.aperture.org
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Liberman kept all the magazines up to date, but never
let the visual focus of the editorial pages stray from
the content his readers had paid to see. At Vogue,
every feature, from Irving Penn's studio photographs
of haute couture to Frances McLaughlin-Gill's
sportswear shots made on a plantation, preserved
the illusion that readers were staring through a
transparent wall at a world that looked remarkably
real. As writer Dawn Powell acidly observed in
1963, Vogue had one overriding function: "to provide
delicious discontent. Here is what other people
have and you haven't; here is where some go and
never you. Here is the lovely land of never, and
you may dream of it, but that's all."='
Overall, Vogue's advertising carried far more
variety and more innovation than its editorial section.
Throughout the 1940s ad pages included work by
artists such as Salvador Dalí, Christian Bérard, and
René Bouché. Cultural taboos challenged artists and photographers
to sell brassieres, girdles, and negligees without inspiring the "wrong"
kind of desire. Vogue staff photographers, such as John Rawlings,
Toni Frisseil, and even Penn, made plenty of ads, adhering to editorial
rules—a useful strategy for advertisers, who could be confident that
their pages would compete successfully with editorial for viewers'
attention. And ads from department stores, fabric companies and
manufacturers, and dress manufacturers show that advertisers used
Vogue to reach the whole garment trade, not just retail customers.
Vogue's ad pages also featured work by Harper's Bazaar staff
members, such as Louise Dahl-Wolfe and Lillian Bassman.
Familiar styles stand out. Mili applied multiple exposures to ads
for Saks Fifth Avenue. Dayton's of Minneapolis bought Blumenfeld
double spreads that required readers to physically rotate the
magazine into a long vertical. Frissell photographed her friends for
Garfinkel's in Washington, D.C. Lynes's surrealist-inflected images
appeared for years at the opening of Vogue as full-page ads for New
York department stores such as Henri Bendel, Bergdorf Goodman,
and Bonwit's (before Avedon took that client away). Using stark,
surreal settings he delivered surprising images with the freedom
and implausibility of dreams.
Even in such sophisticated company, Avedon's originality comes
through. Every frame is tense with contrast between dark and
light, slim and full, real and artificial. Most notably, his models
are not actors behind glass. They occupy a different world, where
it's always breezy, and there's always something going on—like a
man outside the frame reaching in to hand a woman flowers. This
world is a frank fantasy, but the price of entry is within reach— just
buy a dress made of Enka Rayon. (Or buy one for your customers
to find at the store.)
Access to this material has just grown much easier. In late 2011
Conde Nast launched a digital archive of Vogue. They scanned more
than four hundred thousand pages, every issue from 1892 to today,
and cataloged them using information from the original images
and captions; you can search by photographer, model, designer,
advertiser, and more. Less fun (and less dusty) than leafing through
the actual pages—this is also much more expensive: an annual
subscription to the digital archive costs around $1,500.
But whole careers can be uncovered, and missing chapters
added to others. The canon will not change much. However, we can
now begin to follow the history of photography along a narrative
motivated by dollars and common sense.©
NOTES
•• Important reading on this subject includes: Patricia Johnston, Real Fantasies:Edward Steichen's Advertising Photography (Berkeiey: University of CaliforniaPress, 1997), and Micheie H. Bogart, Artists, Advertising, and the Borders ofArt (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995).
= Raymond Wiliiams, "The Magic System," New Left Review 1, no. 4 (Aprii1960); repr. In Simon During, ed.. The Culturai Studies Reader (London andNew York: Routledge, 1993), pp. 421-22.
^ Dawn Poweii, "Lovely Land of Never," New York Times, November 3, 1963,Book Review.
THIS PAGE: Diane and Allan Arbus, advertisement for Burlington Mills,
Vogue, February 1 , 1949; OPPOSITE, CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT:
Gjon Mili, advertisement for Saks Fiftii Avenue/Anthony Blotta, Vogue,
March 1, 1 9 5 1 ; Louise Dahl-Wolfe, advertisement for La Cross Naylon,
Vogue, February 1 5 , 1 9 4 7 ; Richard Avedon, advertisement for Enka
Rayon, Vogue, March 1 , 1 9 5 3 ; Lillian Bassman, advertisement for Gelier
Shoes, Vogue, January 15, 1957.
All magazines photographed by Tom Hayes
/ www.aperture.org
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