A story behind a photograph 3: James Hetfield from Metallica

James Hetfield, Metallica, during Master of Puppets European Tour photographed at the Zenith in Paris  1985. photo: Marc T, published in The Face magazine

In 1985, the in London based  The Face magazine commissioned me to photograph Metallica on tour in Europe, the  Metal band from Los Angeles  was on the way being a huge rock machine.  The deal was unlimited costs but they needed the pictures yesterday and this was a huge restriction, no time for seducing  pr girls and for catching someone who knows someone.  Took cameras and tens of 35mm rolls and jumped on a private jet to Paris.  At that period record companies were pretty greedy with photographers press passes and it was often a big story to snap some photographs. I went to Elektra records in Paris to get a  professional press photo pass. They refused because I was not accredited by a French  magazine or newspaper. I tried to explain and to convince, this time a guy, that The Face was a much more important magazine in rock business than whatever French shit paper. Wrong to do so, if you have to deal with record company pr guys. So I went alone and I bought a black market ticket, officials were sold-out and I was pushed away from the backstage area,  hermetically closed by a bunch of policemen and skinhead monkeys hired in by the concert producers . Went in and was hiding my camera from the security control by giving it to a punky but very good looking girl already inside, I told her that I was a photographer from London working for a big magazine and that she will never forget what is going to happen that evening... and she accepted...  Luckily, I sneaked in, gave her a big kiss, bought her a drink and  promised an original photograph. Went  straight to the front stage  and jumped the barriers. A British photographer that I knew  from New Musical Express saw me and gave me immediately  a  pass that he took out of his pocket. I put it on  and the  monkeys (security guards in front stage areas keeping public and fans away) left me alone, they never paid attention that the pass was from a previous concert date. Metallica printed the same press passes for the entire Master of the Puppets Tour, changing only the dates and venues written by hand by the tour management. The French monkey saw the badge but never read.
All. the lights went out and the whole venue was completely into dark. Thousands of fans started to whistle and to scream, lightning lighters, pushing forward to the fronts stage alerting the monkeys, the magic power of Metallica was filling  the Paris Zenith. I saw James Hetfield's silhouette on stage and started to focus, only one follow spot was on him and I started shooting. Hetfield all alone on stage with his terrific guitar sound, something  extremely dramatic, deep and dark was going on.

The same night I took the girl with me back to London in the private jet for delivering the pictures. Processing and printing and the whole story was just in time for printing the magazine two hours later. The picture was a full page in the Face and they even paid me back the far to expensive black market ticket  for getting inside the venue.  

That night I took the lovely French Punky girl  into the London New Wave scene and she had a original photograph from James Hetfield .
I never saw her again

Images from the past - Ossie Clark 1969. London, United Kingdom.

 Alongside with Biba, photographer David Bailey, top models Twiggy and Jane Shrimpton and a new generation of Cult shops like "Granny Takes a Trip", Ossie Clark was a genius designer in 60's  Swinging  London.

Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy, David Hockney 1970/71.

I cannot mention  Ossie Clark without having  in mind the painting "Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy" from David Hockney  1970/1971,  featuring Ossie Clark and his wife and textile designer Celia Birtwell.. Hockney made the painting short after their wedding.

Ossie Clark wedding in 1970 with textile designer Celia Britwell

Ossie Clark and Celia Britwell

Clark was a major figure in the 1960's "Swinginging London" together with Mary Quant and Biba. a period that was breaking rules in the way of clothing. The Ossie Clark style had a great influence on Yves Saint Laurent, Anna Sui or Tom Ford. When Cecil Beaton  was photographing Ossie Clark, he said about Ossie. Clark,  that he was a modern incarnation of  the typical English with a true vision of the world. The well known shoe designer Manolo Blahnik said about Clark's work:
"He created an incredible magic with the body and achieved what fashion should do - produce desire".

Ossie Clark  1967

The London  from Ossie's vision in the new fashion

1967

Celia Britwell prints

Keith Richard from the Roling Stones with Anita Pallenberg dressed in Ossie Clark  in front of the cult shop "Granny Takes a trip"

Celia Britwell

original Ossie Clark designs revisited in 2008 by Avsh Alom Gur.

Emma Watson in vintage Ossie clark dress.

Ossie Clark inspired following designers; Anna Sui, John Galliano, Christian Lacroix, Dries Van Noten, Malcolm Hall, Clements Ribeiro, Marc Jacobs, Prada and Gucci.

Diego Cogolato.

In 1996 Ossie Clark, 54, was found  at his Holland flat 57 times stabbed to death,  his then 28 years Italian old former lover Diego Cogolato.

Images from the past - Jean Patou 1887 - 1936 Paris, France

Breaking the rules with the classic concept of fashion. In the 1920's  designer Jean Patou and his competitor Coco Chanel were re-making the history of the dress with revolutionary new concepts.

Jean Patou

Jean Patou ( 1887 - 1936) is one of the memorable French designers from the in between two World Wars I and II period. The story of Patou starts in 1912 when opening his first small dressmaking salon "Maison Parry" and his entire 1914  collection was purchased by a single American buyer. During the WW I the House was closed and Patou reopens in 1919.

The elegant Jean Patou in 1924. 

A Blue Print of a period, Jean Patou dresses at Deauville Beach in France 1924

Model in early Patou style

Fast Jean Patou made a huge impression with his new ideas into fashion, he invented the "flapper look" by lengthening the skirt, and introducing sportswear for women.
He also invented the knitted swimwear and the tennis skirt for the extravagant Suzane Lenglen (1899 - 1938,  French tennis champion that won 31 championships between 1914 and 1926), he designed the daring and in that period scandalous  sleeveless and thigh-length cut tennis dress.

Tennis star Suzanne Lenglen in the first Jean Patou tennis wear

The extravagant Suzanne Lenglen in Jean Patou made a world's turn over in short sportswear, Chanel  in the same period created her little black dress..

 

Ski-wear in the 1930's

revolution in lenght

In the same period he popularized the cardigan. Later, in the 1920's  he invented the "designer's tie" using women's dress material for making his ties and they were displayed in department stores next to women's perfumes. Those ties were a source of inspiration for the designers Louis Feraud, Timothy Everest, Duchamp and Paul Smith. A few years later, Jean Patou created the "Huile de Chaldee" the very first sun tan oil.

When the 1929 stock market crashed the House of Patou survived almost and only through its perfumes. The best known perfume is "Joy" a heavy floral scent based on the most precious rose and jasmine. This perfume remained the most costliest perfume in the world and fragrance history, 15 ml was prized at 175 Pound Sterling in the 1930's!!! .

 In 1959 Karl Lagerfeld became  art director at Jean Patou fashion house. 

Dorian Leigh in Jean Patou evening dress

Jean Patou  was a great hat designer, The hat in Patou's vision was a accessory for the dress

Ironically,Jean Patou, the designer of beach and sports wear passed away  the year  that the French government accepted the annual holiday law in 1936. Drawing by Jean Patou.

Christian Lacroix for the Jean Patou House

Images from the past - fashion clip from Jacques Heim 1967. Paris, France

Jacques Heim, was a less flamboyant actor from the New Look Fashion Theatre, but has in his own way contributed to establish the new style. 

The Parisian couturier Jacques Heim (1899 - 1967) was an outsider in the 1950's explosion of the New Look created by Christian Dior and sustained by designers like Cristobal Balenciaga and Jacques Fath.
Jacques Heim, a tall and very good-looking man with a jovial temperament, seemed more like a business man or banker than a couturier. He exhibited none of the flamboyance of his competitors like Christian Dior or Yves Saint Laurent.

First Jacques Heim catalog Spring 1939

Jacques Heim drawings for his catalog  I Love this Dress 1939

Jacques Heim evening dress 1946

Caroline Rennolds Milbank in her book "Couture -1985) called Jacques Heim an innovator by nature.  While the international fashion press at that period did not regard Jacques Heim as a leading designer, it makes no doubts that the designer had an real influence on the scene. The collection 'Heim Jeunes Filles - Heim Young Girls in 1930 and the 1937 " Heim Actualite Girls" wear collection were both a source of inspiration for the later designers of the 1950's and 1960's.

The New Look  top model Dorian Leigh posing with  the fragrance J'Aime.

After the success of the fragrance Alambie in 1947, Jacques Heim created and produced some well known and today considered as top perfumes like  J'Aime (1958) and Shandoah (1966). The J'Aime  perfume was the inspiration for the famous Christian Dior J'Adore.
Not really driven by the market he was at least keenly sensitive to it and he had the honor of being the President of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture between 1958 and 1962. In 1950 he published his own magazine 'Revue Heim"
Jacques Heim was a smart, eclectic designer of many styles. His privileged clients, Madame Charles de Gaulle or Mrs Dwight D. Eisenhower and actress Gloria Swanson were adoring this exceptional gentleman.

Jacques Heim on the French Vogue cover 

Top model Dorian Leigh and New Look icon  in a evening dress

Through consistent sales sensibility he has formed, persevered and prospered a stylish fashion house for nearly 40 years. The house Jacques Heim was closed in 1969

The New Look signatures by Christian Dior, Jacques Fath and Jacques Heim

New in the 1950's

Jacques Heim dress photographed by Willy Maywald

Jeunes Filles Collection, the spirit of the 1950's

Jacques Heim invented the bikini and called his beach collection after the "Atol Bikini " a  US nuclear experiment spot in the Pacific.

The Bikini was forbidden on the American Beaches considered as outrageous scandalous !.

Images from the past. Cristobal Balenciaga 1895 / 1972 Spain/France

"He is Fashion's Picasso"

Cecil Beaton

The young Cristobal Balenciaga photographed in Paris in 1937.

Balenciaga in his fashion house, 10 Avenue George V, Paris

Balenciaga at work

In the 1950's Christian Dior launched the New Look with a never seen impact on the women's new way of dressing.  Jacques Fath transformed women into diva's and  Cristobal Balenciaga was the undisputed architect of this new era, an exceptional talented designer who's story is like a legend.
Born in 1895 in Guetaria, a small fishing village on the Spanish Basque coast,   the very young Balenciage  was attracted to couture and it was apparent that his destiny was into creation. At the age of 13, he astounded the Marquise of Casa Torres with his comments on her elegance. The Marquise understood his interest in couture and his aesthetic sensibilities, she ordered to make a copy of the haute couture clothing she was wearing. The result was astonishing and the Marquise of casa Torres awarded the young Cristobal by wearing his version of the haute couture dress during society events.
A year later he travelled to Paris and  discovered the collections of great designers like Doucet, Worth, Drecoll and many other. Back in Spain, at the age of 16, he opens his first couture workshop adapting the Parisian fashion for the Spanish women.

Charles Frederick Worth inspired Balenciaga.

It is in 1915 that Balenciaga opens his first fashion house in San Sebastian under the name "Balenciaga" and followed by a second showroom in Madrid in 1920. Cristobal Balenciaga left Spain when the Civil War broke out and established himself in Paris.
It is in August 1937 that  Balenciaga's  will make a turning point in its career. He opened his first showrooms at 10 Avenue George V and from this ultimate moment a typical style was created which in thirty glorious years.transformed Balenciaga in an aesthetic and unique design statement and he changed women's silhouettes.

  Cristobal Balenciaga  was drawing with Chinese ink and using painters watercolors

After having a considerable influence on Hubert de Givenchy, Manuel Ungaro, Jean-Louis Scherrer or Andre Courreges, Balenciaga passed away on March 24 1972 in his home in Valencia, Spain.
Balenciaga was considered as the master of the masters by the great fashion designers.

" A couturier must be an architect for design,

a sculptor for the shape,

a painter for the color,

a musician for harmony,

and 

a philosopher for temperance'

Cristobal Balenciaga

Baroness Pauline de Rotchild was a loyal Balenciaga devotee.
" His name became synonymous with perfection and elegance"
Baroness de Rotchild 1973.

C. Balenciaga "short" dress in Figaro Magazine 1950

Cristobal Balenciaga  " Veste Pincee" in 1950

A white organdi dress from C.F. Worth.
C.F.Worth was one of the designers that had a significant influence on Balenciaga's later work.
Photo: Henri Clark for Le Figaro Magazine 1950.

 Vogue magazine October 15 1953.
photography: John Rawlings.

Bolero Jacket from 1946.
Hamish Bowles collection

detail of bolero jacket.
Burgundy silk, velvet, jet and passementerie embrodery by Bataille.
Hamish Bowles collection.

Cecil Beaton.
"In his work Balenciaga shows the refinement of France and the strength of Spain.
He uses fabric like a sculptor working in marble."

1967                             2010