from February 28 , 2020 to January 4, 2021
Launched in 1867 in New York by Harper & Brothers, Harper's Bazaar is aimed at women in order to educate them in matters of fashion, society, art and literature. In the tradition of European fashion gazettes, it presents the originality of a commitment to the cause of women. Its first editor, Mary Louise Booth, was a suffragist, abolitionist, and supporter of the Union during the American Civil War. The Francophilia of this literary woman echoes throughout the history of the magazine. In the XX th century, Picasso, Cocteau, Matisse are among many French artists whose magazine surrounds. Bazaar also devotes articles to figures from the American School such as Jackson Pollock, Franck Stella or William Burroughs.
It is also a literary review of international scope which welcomes the writings of Colette, Simone de Beauvoir, Françoise Sagan, Jean Genet, André Malraux while giving the English-language writers primary attention: Charles Dickens, Virginia Woolf, Patricia Highsmith, Truman Capote and Carson McCullers wrote in Bazaar .
Beyond the content, it is the aesthetic aspect of the graphic composition which constitutes the richness of the magazine. The balance between fashion images and the acuteness of its criticism make Harper's Bazaar a benchmark in the history of graphic design and fashion. The great couturiers and dressmakers: Charles-Frederick Worth, Paul Poiret, Jeanne Lanvin, Madeleine Vionnet, Elsa Schiaparelli, Christian Dior, Cristobal Balenciaga owe part of their myth to the influence of Bazaar .
Deployed on both levels of the fashion galleries, the chronological and thematic exhibition offers an immersion in the magazine by placing the dresses in front of their very enlarged original publication. The path highlights Harper's Bazaar's contribution to the evolution of the figure for 150 years and tells how these magazine images were constructed. The exhibition integrates, in fact, sketches, photos and patterns which preceded the fashion image and nourished its inspiration.
The route opens with a brief reminder of the history of fashion periodicals in the 16th century.century. Mary L. Booth, first editor-in-chief in 1867, set the tone for the magazine and introduced the creations of Parisian fashion designer Charles-Frederick Worth, much appreciated by wealthy American clients. The magazine takes part in the evolution of styles by testifying successively to the taste for Art Nouveau, then to the orientalism of the Ballets Russes and Paul Poiret who inspired the covers that Erté designed in the Roaring Twenties. It was at this time that the photographs of Baron Adolphe de Meyer oriented the magazine towards a photographic aesthetic that later George Hoyningen-Huene or George Platt-Lynes tinted with surrealism, in unison with the illustrations of Cassandre appearing on the cover. This style responds to the creations of Elsa Schiaparelli or Madeleine Vionnet, giving fashion a metaphysical and antique dimension.
Emphasis is placed on the importance of the " holy trinity " which, in the 1930s, made Bazaar an avant-garde luxury magazine: Carmel Snow - editor-in-chief combines the talent of Alexey Brodovitch - director artistic - and Diana Vreeland - fashion columnist. Vreeland stands out as a photographic stylist, opening the magazine to wide open spaces and sunny bodies that Louise Dahl-Wolfe captures in Kodachrome color.
Carmel Snow introduces big names in photography such as Man Ray then Richard Avedon, in perfect harmony with fashion trends: Avedon's lyricism lends itself to the soaring of post-war evening dresses. It also baptized the first collection “ New Look ” by Christian Dior in 1947, initiating a true Golden Age. However, the 1950s called Bazaar into question as seen in the movie Funny Face with Audrey Hepburn in the lead. The time has come for existentialism and already for the first illustrations of Andy Warhol. The evolution of Richard Avedon and new photographic optical resources lead to the Pop and Op revolution of the famous futuristic issue of April 1965.
Following him, the photographer Hiro made fashion a field of experimentation by drawing inspiration from kinetic art and by combining color films and flashes. Auras, distortions, iridescence of 1970s clichés are also reflected in the colorful and brilliant fashion design of the DDD years : Disco, Dallas and Dynasty set the tone for the Bazaar1980s directed by Mazolla marked by the presence on the cover of the portraits of celebrities from the Star System photographed in ektachrome and in very close-up. In 1992, Liz Tilberis, editor, and Fabien Baron, artistic director, revived the classic elegance of the magazine thanks to a redesign of its typography and the choice of an assertive aesthetic. Linda Evangelista and Kate Moss are highlighted by Patrick Demarchelier or Peter Lindbergh.
With the arrival of Glenda Bailey in 2001, as editor-in-chief, accompanied by Stephen Gan and Elisabeth Hummer - artistic directors, the magazine becomes a spectacle and opens up to fantasy. Photographers such as Jean-Paul Goude or Simon Procter are magazine leaders. The time has come for backstage, behind the scenes, large photographic compositions and ambitious risk-taking. The beauty and brilliance of the magazine come with great respect for its history, however.
This exhibition is the first devoted to a fashion magazine which is not limited to the simple presentation of photographs: it looks as much on the question of artistic direction as on the impact of graphics and photography, on the role of women and men who, as much as those who create and wear it, defend a certain idea of fashion. In a museum which has made fashion one of its pillars, it is worth remembering that the fashion magazine is very often the first material which allows its history to be written as it is also the first. vehicle for the dissemination and knowledge of fashion, an element of definition of its identity, a fundamental player in the fashion system put here in its proper perspective.