Les deux déesses - two masterworks by Christian Dior, 1949

 

The Dior gowns for fall/winter 1949-50, Junon and Vénus, photographed at the Pré Catalan in Paris for Harper's Bazaar by Richard Avedon, August, 1949.

Junon, named after the Roman queen of the gods, Juno - the Greek Hera - the blue sequined embellishment a reference to Juno's sacred animal, the peacock.

Vénus, named after the Roman goddess of love - the Greek Aphrodite - the wavy, pearlescent spangles a reference to Venus' "nautical" birth. 

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Two more of Avedon's images, photographed at the Pré Catalan in the summer of 1949.

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As one might expect, the care and preservation of these iconic garments is quite challenging. Dust and dirt need to be carefully vacuumed from yards and yards of fragile, unwashable silk net, which is covered in thousands of sequins, paillettes, and beading that can only be cleaned by hand, individually, one at a time. And then loss of the embellishments is a great concern, as the aging thread that attaches sequins and the like eventually fails, and each fallen bit needs to be accounted for and reattached. All of this while putting the least amount of stress on extremely delicate fabric that is more than seventy-five years old.

Shadow-work and the texture of light - photographs by Emmanuel Sougez

 

Prismes, circa 1940.

Château de cartes, 1928.

Film négatif, 1928.

Eperlans, 1935.

Copeaux, 1931.

Rosée, 1929.

Satin et plumes, 1933.

Lingerie, 1935.

Lilas, circa 1930s.

Pelote de ficelle, 1931.

La poire coupée, 1930.

Ananas, 1930.

Le Bol cassé, 1933.

Trois litres, 1953.

Epi de blé, 1930.

Trois poires, 1931.

Iris, 1930.

Corde dans une fenêtre, 1932.

Œufs-soleil, 1933.

Lanternes, 1931.

Sardines, 1932.

Alphabet, circa 1932.

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Louis-Victor-Emmanuel Sougez (16 July 1889, Bordeaux - 24 August 1972, Paris), French photographer. At the age of fifteen he enrolled at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux, where he initially studied art, but he soon abandoned that to concentrate on photography. From 1905 to 1914, he travelled widely, including Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. After the First World War, he became a freelance photographer, based in Paris. There he formed the group Le Rectangle which exhibited modern photography and then, with some of its members, post-WWII, he helped establish its successor, Le Groupe des XV. Then, in the 1950s, he joined Les 30 x 40. Previously, in 1926, he founded the photographic department for the French weekly newspaper, L'Illustration, where he promoted the use of color photography. He died in the French capital at the age of eighty-three.

Westerly - paintings of women and girls by Enomoto Chikatoshi

 

Spring by a Pond, 1932.

 Lady with Terrier on Leash, two-panel screen, circa late 1930s.

Ski, for the Ministry of Railroads, 1938.

The set of six paintings comprising the "Florida" series, circa 1935.

The Ballroom Florida - its name taken from a Parisian nightclub - first opened 1928, and was one of Japan's foremost jazz-age dance halls.

The young women pictured are believed to represent the elegant "taxi dancers" who were employees of the establishment and/or some of the club's chic clientele.

A Thousand Needles to Support the Troops, circa late 1930s.

Silver Mountain, 1939 - or - Snow-Capped Mountaintop, 1942.

Another version of the above.

Beauty Under the Cherry Blossoms, circa early 1930s. The only figure, here, to be portrayed in traditional Japanese attire.

Winter Scene of a Young Beauty Adjusting her Skis, two-panel screen, circa 1936-40.

Aquarium, 1939.

Playing Yo-Yo, 1933.

I'm not entirely sure, but I believe that the "noise" evident in the detail images of this piece is actually the weave of the silk used as the ground for the painting. 

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Garden, 1934. Frustratingly, I couldn't find a larger image of this painting - I tried!

But the detail of the shoes, which I did find, was too delicious not to share. 

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Enomoto Chikatoshi (榎本 千花俊; 3 March 1898, Tokyo - 30 March 1973), Japanese painter and printmaker. In 1916, he began to study painting under Kaburaki Kiyokata, and graduated from the Nihonga Department of the Tokyo School of Fine Art in 1921. In 1922 he first had a painting accepted at a government-sponsored exhibition, the 4th Teiten. In 1930, his Teiten work won the tokusen or grand prize. He subsequently exhibited annually at the Teiten, and afterwards at nearly every Shin-Bunten with non-vetted status (mukansa). During his career, he frequently exhibited his work in both Japan and in the United States. Beginning in the early Thirties he became well-known for his “modern” (modan) paintings of beautiful women, continuing in the traditional Japanese genre of bijin-ga, but portraying his subjects dressed in up-to-the-moment Western fashion. After WWII, he became a committee member of the Nitten. Today, examples of his art are included in such major collections as the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Chicago Art Institute, and the Tokyo Museum of Modern Art.