Monroe Under the Lights, Gagosian Brings Richard Avedon’s Hollywood to Beverly Hills
More than 120 photographs, from Marilyn Monroe to Steven Spielberg, will open on Camden Drive in November alongside Ron Howard’s documentary.
Gagosian will open Hollywood, a survey of more than 120 photographs by Richard Avedon, at its Beverly Hills gallery at 456 North Camden Drive on November 4, with an opening reception from 6 to 8 p.m. The exhibition runs through December 19.
Curated by the Richard Avedon Foundation and designed by Cécile Degos, the show spans more than half a century and sets some of his most iconic portraits beside rarely seen images. “Picturing defining figures from Marilyn Monroe and Katharine Hepburn to John Ford and Steven Spielberg, Avedon’s images consistently convey an extraordinary sense of intimacy and individuality,” the gallery said in its announcement.
The pull of the movies was personal. In the summer of 1956, Avedon was in Paris consulting on Funny Face, the 1957 Stanley Donen musical starring Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire that was loosely based on his own life. Gagosian notes that he briefly considered giving up photography for film directing and kept a lifelong fascination with Hollywood.
The sitters reach well past the marquee. The gallery says they include actors, directors, writers, producers and composers, as well as the industry’s financial brokers and its critics. Among the images DSCENE singled out are Monroe in a dress by Norell, photographed in New York in May 1957, and Spielberg, photographed in Los Angeles in February 1994.
The opening coincides with Avedon, a documentary directed by the Academy Award winner Ron Howard that premiered at this year’s Festival de Cannes. The Camden Drive gallery is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m., closing at half past five.
