| Names: | Born: Cecil Walter Hardy Beaton
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| | Dates: | 1904, 14 January - 1980, 18 January | | Born: | Great Britain, London, Hampstead | | Died: | England, Wiltshire, BroadChalke | | Active: | England |
English fashion and society photographer who from 1928 onwards working for ‘Vogue‘ and ‘Vanity Fair‘. During the Second World War he became a war photographer. He is also known for his theatrical design work. He also won two Oscars for costume design - "My Fair Lady" (1964) and "Gigi" (1958).Preparing biographies
Beaton launched his career as a ‘society’ photographer in 1926 with an exhibition in London which won him an immediate contract with Vogue, where he worked for the next thirty years. His style was inspired by figures such as E.O. Hoppe, Edward Steichen and Baron de Meyer, the most successful magazine photographers of the 1910's and 1920's. Beaton’s fascination with glamour and high society prevailed throughout his life and in 1937 he became court photographer to the British Royal Family. He also became a successful stage and costume designer, most notably for 'My Fair Lady' and 'Gigi'.
This biography is courtesy and copyright of the Victoria & Albert Museum and is included here with permission.
Date last updated: 11 Nov 2011.
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| Wikipedia has a biography of this photographer. | Show on this site | Go to website | | Getty Research, Los Angeles, USA has an ULAN (Union List of Artists Names Online) entry for this photographer. This is useful for checking names and they frequently provide a brief biography. | | Go to website | Grove Art Online (www.groveart.com) has a biography of this artist.
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The following books are useful starting points to obtain brief biographies but they are not substitutes for the monographs on individual photographers. |
• Auer, Michele & Michel 1985 Encyclopedie Internationale Des Photographes de 1839 a Nos Jours / Photographers Encylopaedia International 1839 to the present (Hermance, Editions Camera Obscura) 2 volumes [A classic reference work for biographical information on photographers.]
• Beaton, Cecil & Buckland, Gail 1975 The Magic Eye: The Genius of Photography from 1839 to the Present Day (Boston and Toronto: Little, Brown & Company) p.177 [Useful short biographies with personal asides and one or more example images.]
• Capa, Cornell (ed.) 1984 The International Center of Photography: Encyclopedia of Photography (New York, Crown Publishers, Inc. - A Pound Press Book) p.58-59
• Evans, Martin Marix (Executive ed.) 1995 Contemporary Photographers [Third Edition] (St. James Press - An International Thomson Publishing Company) [Expensive reference work but highly informative.]
• Fernandez, Horacio (ed.) 2000 Fotografía Pública: Photography in Print 1919-1939 (Aldeasa) p.55 [This Spanish exhibition catalogue is one of the best sources for illustrations of photomontage and book design for the period between the two World Wars.]
• Lenman, Robin (ed.) 2005 The Oxford Companion to the Photograph (Oxford: Oxford University Press) [Includes a short biography on Cecil Beaton.]
• Witkin, Lee D. and Barbara London 1979 The Photograph Collector’s Guide (London: Secker and Warburg) p.81-82 [Long out of print but an essential reference work - the good news is that a new edition is in preparation.]
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If there is an analysis of a single photograph or a useful self portrait I will highlight it here. |
• Bauret, Gabriel (ed. and text) 2001 Color Photography (New York: Assouline) [Includes example color photographs by Cecil Beaton]
• Gruber, Renate and L. Fritz Gruber 1982 The Imaginary Photo Museum (New York: Harmony Books) p.241
• Sobieszek, Robert A. and Deborah Irmas 1994 the camera i: Photographic Self-Portraits (Los Angeles: LACMA - Los Angeles County Museum of Art) p.207, Plate 73 [When the Audrey and Sydney Irmas collection was donated to LACMA - Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1992 the museum gained a remarkable collection of self portraits of notable photographers. If you need a portrait of Cecil Beaton this is a useful starting point.]
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