Guy Bourdin, fashion photographer, 'Image Maker'.
The same day I went with friends to see this exhibition at Somerset House, London,
The Sun newspaper announced the end of page three*.
So image, particularly images of women, was a hot topic of conversation.
Men taking photos of women.
Women's bodies used to sell things.
During his training, Guy Bourdin spent time with the surrealist, Man-Ray.
Bourdin seems to have had a thing for shoes.
In the 1970s, for a Charles Jourdan advertising campaign,
Bourdin dispensed with the women altogether, well most of the female body,
and took mannequin legs around Britain on a month long trip to take photos of shoes.
Very playful and still very much the female form.
A bit like one of those optical illusions when all that is drawn are dots,
but you can't help seeing a 3D cube.
"How on earth did he get them to stand up?"
Bourdin made films too.
There was something about that make-up.
Triggering memories of experimenting with cream eye-shadow that came out of tubes.
Blue for my friend and brown for me.
At this point, my friend admitted to still having her first pale pearl lipstick.
Joyfully we reminisced about lip-gloss,
Roll-on, scented, cherry, lip-gloss.
"There's your blue eye-shadow!"
In our teens, where did our ideas of self image, beauty,
make-up and body shape come from?
We conferred and it seems that for us, it was primarily Jackie magazine.
If you were lucky, a lip-gloss was the free-gift.
"But we didn't appreciate our figures when we were younger."
There's so much to say about the shapes of women's bodies.
This furniture is a reminder of yet another body shape.
My Sindy doll had that chest of drawers, the 'Sindy' version.
Sindy's body shape; waist, bust and hips, surely not aspirational anymore.
Aspirational?
Didn't we all want to be a princess (and the pea)?
Incredible shape,
movement,
and legs.
Playing with shape.
Bourdin's photography is intended, like surrealism, to disturb then delight.
For us it did both.
Delight and consternation.
Questions about body shapes, modelling at what price,
how women's bodies are used for publicity
and although not page three, all the women in this exhibition where the same shape.
So for balance, here are our shapes.
Guy Bourdin: Image Maker is on at Somerset House until 15th March 2015.
Details on the Somerset House website, here.
*The Sun stopping 'page 3', appears to ave been a publicity stunt.
It stopped for all of two days.
Details on the Somerset House website, here.
*The Sun stopping 'page 3', appears to ave been a publicity stunt.
It stopped for all of two days.
This looks like a fascinating exhibit. I love advertising art, especially from the 40's and 50's. I just read an article about the series of photos with the legs and thought it was really interesting. I'd never heard of those photos before the article but now I'm intrigued.
ReplyDeleteFascinating post Katharine. Sounds like an intriguing exhibition. And yes, Jackie magazine was a formative influence on my life too.
ReplyDeleteIt's scary when I think how much attention, I paid to Jackie magazine. AND to compare it to todays magazines. Why do half of them even exist?
DeleteGosh he certainly was keen on legs and shoes wasn't he! xx
ReplyDeleteAh! Knee socks in the '60s! I loved this look when at art college - my friends and I scoured Selfridges for skimpy tweed boarding school uniform coats to complete the look.
ReplyDeleteBut I don't think knee socks ever became a cool look again.
I've been through various sock phases. Just want warm ones now. Loved the socks in the 70s with individual toes.
DeleteHello Katharine,
ReplyDeleteThis is a most intriguing post. We knew little about Guy Bourdin, so it has been most interesting to find out more.
One can definitely see the influence of the surrealists in his work and he has a most original eye for composition. We can just imagine the fun he would have had carrying round mannequin limbs and placing them in different situations. It reminds us of Lester Gaba and his mannequin friend, Cynthia!
Somerset House is so often host to fascinating exhibitions and, if only we were in town, then we should definitely visit.
Somerset House has a great mix of exhibitions. Just posted about 'Mapping London' today. Also has a great mix of free and paying exhibitions. Something for everyone. Off to look up Lester Gaba. Should I feel embarrassed not to have heard of him?
DeleteBourdin was an interesting photographer: thank you for sharing a fascinating exhibition. It certainly shows the Man Ray influence, and also the times when he worked. The pair of legs are amusing, and yes, how did he pose them like that? Great post, Katharine.
ReplyDeleteThat photo you are referring to is a bit of a mix. Makes me think he's playing at the magician, cutting women in half.
DeleteI found this exhibition very challenging. It is multi layered. The artistic aspect, no one else had ever thought of using bit s of mannequins to represent bits of women. Is that ok or not? I can argue for both yes and no. Given the influences of his peers at the time he was very innovative. Some of his work that I found incredibly offensive also was incredibly inspiring. At the end of the day isn't that the real role of artists? A debate on this would be most welcomed.
ReplyDeleteI found some of his work a challenge too. I debated whether to discuss some of the pieces that bothered me. They where few and far between. As it said in the exhihibition interpretation, he intended to disturb and delight. One very positive thing we saw in the exhibition, to do with women's bodies, was 'imperfection'. We actually saw cellulite, which we were so struck by as so much is air-brushed out these days, leading us to believe that perfect (I shouldn't say perfect, because I don't believe that airbrushed skin is perfection) skin is real. Even though I wasn't happy with all his work, I felt that there was an honesty in his photos. It was about him (telling a narrative), as much as it was about the women in the photos.
DeleteFascinating post with compelling images. So much to comment on, I like the parallels you draw with the Sun 'controversy' Does Bourdin's focus on the legs and feet objectify the female form as much as the Sun's narrow focus on another part of the female form or is Bourdin more subversive than that? I wish I could see this exhibition in it's entirety. Moving on, I had that Sindy furniture too!
ReplyDeleteShauna.
Thanks. I struggled to write this post as I didn't want it to come across as a fluffy, 'didn't I have a nice time going to an exhibition' post. See my reply to Mo above too. I am still not completely happy with what I wrote, even though, the post rrepresents our genuine engagement with Bourdin's photos, I left alot of our chat out. We did discuss women's bodies, how they were percieved by men, women and The Sun a lot on that day. I just didn't know how to take those issues further on the blog. Not sure I have the skill (yet) to debate the issues seriously givivng them the attention and words they deserve in writing. However, I love the way in chatting with friends, the conversation flows from the politically serious to the whimsical. All good healthy conversation.
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