Lee Miller
War and Fashion
September 8, 2017–March 4, 2018
Opening: September 8, 5–7pm
Kulturhuset Stadsteatern
Gallery 3
Sergels torg
Stockholm
Sweden
www.kulturhusetstadsteatern.se
Press meeting: September 8, 10am
Antony Penrose will attend. Please RSVP to Stefan Zachrisson, press officer at Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, stefan.lava.zachrisson [at] stockholm.se.
Who was Lee Miller? Undoubtedly a complex and extraordinary woman. After she died at the age of 70 in 1977, the wife of her son Antony Penrose found a hoard of pictures which Lee Miller had hidden away, repressed and ignored. She was recognised for her work as a war correspondent, photographically witnessing everything from the hell in the Nazi death camps to the liberation of Paris in 1944. In between, her life as a successful model, the muse of Surrealism, and Man Ray’s lover, was frequently in the media.
On the one hand a pragmatic, adventurous seeker of truth. On the other—according to conventional views—a (beautiful) source of inspiration for male artists. But Lee Miller was nobody’s belle, she was an independent, active woman, regardless of what she turned her attention to, be it the terrors of the Second World War or gourmet cooking.
She didn’t say much about her career as a fashion photographer, and neither did anyone else, since portrayals of war outshine narratives of fashion. But nothing impacts on fashion as profoundly as wars. The destruction of war causes everyday situations that lead not only to change but also to renewal in fashion. Fashion is a litmus paper for its own era, revealing everything from social circumstances to ideas about the future.
This exhibition features several photographs that have never before been shown in public. Our warm thanks to Lee Miller’s son Antony Penrose and his family, who opened up Lee Miller’s home and archive in Chiddingly, Sussex, to enable the exhibition. Their generosity made it possible for us to put together this unique material.
The exhibition is produced by Kulturhuset Stadsteatern.
