Newly released photographs of Coco Chanel are on display at the SeaFair yacht at the Miami Beach Marina. Snapped over three weeks in 1962 by Douglas Kirkland, the exhibit is presented by New York’s Westwood Gallery.
The mythology of The House of Chanel has two dimensions– illustrious and elite. Kirkland;s photos show the woman in there. Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel was born poor, and by age 12 had landed in an orphanage run by nuns, who taught her sewing as a trads. She owed her first fortunes to the lovers who kept her in cash. She was, in Kirkland’s memory, a chain-smoker, gossip monger, dogged money-maker. These facts have no bearing, of course, on her status as a sartorial genius and arguably the most influential fashion designer of the 20th century.
Exhibition: Coco Chanel, Three Weeks, 1962, by Douglas Kirkland. Photographs available for purchase at Westwood Gallery NYC.