This book accompanies the Fall 2013 exhibition of Richard Avedon's photography to be held at Gagosian Gallery Beverly Hills. Over his sixty-year career, photographer Richard Avedon was renowned for his distinctive, transformative eye. Women were often his subject, through his fashion work for Harper's Bazaar and Vogue and in his portraiture of both the famous and the unknown. What might have been pictured as prosaic or unattractive through another photographer's lens was presented by Avedon as unconventional, surprising, and sometimes revelatory. Through approximately 120 images, Avedon: Women explores Avedon's unique artistic perspective. The book includes essays by Joan Juliet Buck and Abigail Solomon-Godeau. -Dynamic unbound format available in three colorful translucent plastic covers, each with a unique image. -32 b&w contact prints from the Avedon archives, many previously unpublished -26 color images- two reproductions of vintage tear sheets and 24 rarely seen color transparencies from the Avedon archives -1 double gatefold, removable from layouts -4 Vellum Overlay spreads

“Wise and ebullient . . . . Gefter takes the reader inside so many of Avedon’s photo shoots, and so deftly explicates his work, that you’re thirsty to sate your eyes with Avedon’s actual images . . . . One of the achievements of Gefter’s biography is to argue persuasively for Avedon’s place, as a maker of portraits, as one of the 20th century’s most consequential artists.” — Dwight Garner, New York Times "Gefter weaves the particulars of Avedon’s life story into a larger narrative about American culture in the decades after World War II . . . . Read in the context of our own precarious political and ecological moment, this assessment alone argues eloquently for the abiding, even urgent relevance of Avedon’s imperfect Art." — Caroline Weber, New York Times Book Review “Imagine the offspring of Marcel Proust and the Energizer Bunny—that’s who Richard Avedon was, a chronicler of fashion, an analyst of social types, the author in pictures of his era. And Philip Gefter captures him. His biography is an Avedon of Avedon.” — Louis Menand, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Metaphysical Club “Mesmerizing. . . . Like Avedon’s blank white backgrounds, blasted with light, Gefter’s pages expose in a controlled and intelligent manner all the bigness and littleness of one of the greats.” — Brad Gooch, New York Times bestselling author of Flannery and City Poet "A compelling, beautifully written examination of Avedon's life as it reflects the larger cultural milieu of post–World War II New York, and, more importantly, an argument for the role of the artist in contemporary society." — Stephen Shore, photographer "The portrait that emerges in these pages is not only a biography of the artist—his professional triumphs and disappointments and personal demons—but also a beautifully written assessment of his work, which brings Avedon to life and also vividly evokes his most memorable images." — Kate Betts, Air Mail “Revealing, fluent, and very well written—an exemplary biography of an underappreciated artist.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review) "Gefter’s expert, comprehensive, and sensitive biography embodies the electricity and complexity of Avedon’s work as he centers Avedon within the crossfire of both the battle to legitimize photography as a fine art form and the struggle for gay rights… Gefter’s engrossing portrait of a master portraitist vividly proves his claim that Avedon is “one of the most consequential artists of the twentieth century." — Booklist, starred review "Definitive and insightful." — Publishers Weekly "With this engrossing biography, readers will come away with a greater appreciation of Avedon’s artistic strengths and achievements, as well as the complex man behind the camera." — Library Journal (starred review) "Philip Gefter’s welcome new biography . . . takes Avedon at his own estimation as a serious 20th-century artist. It creates a dense, convincing portrait of a man with huge talent and a gift for life." — Scott Eyman, Wall Street Journal

This monograph on the work of Gideon Lewin, master printer and assistant to Richard Avedon, revealsmoments never told, stories never heard, and a life that only a few ever experienced. It is a story of a close working relationship and collaboration with a master. Avedon: Behind the Scenes, 1964-1980 relates Lewin's personal experiences working with Richard Avedon for 16 years. It is about the hard work, the intrigues, the energy, the mysteries, the humor, and the commitment to creating images that were larger-than-life and will last for generations. This book illuminates many details about preparations for Avedon's major exhibitions, the master classes he was a part of, and many behind-the-scenes stories working on fashion collections in Paris and in New York for Harper's Bazaar and Vogue, photographing the world's most famous personalities and most beautiful women: Sophia Loren, Audrey Hepburn, Catherine Deneuve, Cher, Jean Shrimpton, Veruschka, Twiggy, Rene Russo, Patti Hansen, and Lauren Hutton. Finally, this book opens a window on the lighter side of Richard Avedon, as well as his total dedication to the art of photography in his determination to leave a legacy unlike that of any other photographer. With about 200 photographs Avedon: Behind the Scenes, 1964-1980 is a singular and remarkable journey.

An intimate biography of Richard Avedon, the legendary fashion and portrait photographer who “helped define America’s image of style, beauty and culture” (The New York Times), by his longtime collaborator and business partner Norma Stevens and award-winning author Steven M. L. Aronson. Richard Avedon was arguably the world’s most famous photographer—as artistically influential as he was commercially successful. Over six richly productive decades, he created landmark advertising campaigns, iconic fashion photographs (as the star photographer for Harper’s Bazaar and then Vogue), groundbreaking books, and unforgettable portraits of everyone who was anyone. He also went on the road to find and photograph remarkable uncelebrated faces, with an eye toward constructing a grand composite picture of America. Avedon dazzled even his most dazzling subjects. He possessed a mystique so unique it was itself a kind of genius—everyone fell under his spell. But the Richard Avedon the world saw was perhaps his greatest creation: he relentlessly curated his reputation and controlled his image, managing to remain, for all his exposure, among the most private of celebrities. No one knew him better than did Norma Stevens, who for thirty years was his business partner and closest confidant. In Avedon: Something Personal—equal parts memoir, biography, and oral history, including an intimate portrait of the legendary Avedon studio—Stevens and co-author Steven M. L. Aronson masterfully trace Avedon’s life from his birth to his death, in 2004, at the age of eighty-one, while at work in Texas for The New Yorker (whose first-ever staff photographer he had become in 1992). The book contains startlingly candid reminiscences by Mike Nichols, Calvin Klein, Claude Picasso, Renata Adler, Brooke Shields, David Remnick, Naomi Campbell, Twyla Tharp, Jerry Hall, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Bruce Weber, Cindy Crawford, Donatella Versace, Jann Wenner, and Isabella Rossellini, among dozens of others. Avedon: Something Personal is the confiding, compelling full story of a man who for half a century was an enormous influence on both high and popular culture, on both fashion and art—to this day he remains the only artist to have had not one but two retrospectives at the Metropolitan Museum of Art during his lifetime. Not unlike Richard Avedon’s own defining portraits, the book delivers the person beneath the surface, with all his contradictions and complexities, and in all his touching humanity.

Defining Women explores the social and cultural construction of gender and the meanings of woman, women, and femininity as they were negotiated in the pioneering television series Cagney and Lacey, starring two women as New York City police detectives. Julie D'Acci illuminates the tensions between the television industry, the series production team, the mainstream and feminist press, various interest groups, and television viewers over competing notions of what women could or could not be--not only on television but in society at large. Cagney and Lacey, which aired from 1981 to 1988, was widely recognized as an innovative treatment of working women and developed a large and loyal following. While researching this book, D'Acci had unprecedented access to the set, to production meetings, and to the complete production files, including correspondence from network executives, publicity firms, and thousands of viewers. She traces the often heated debates surrounding the development of women characters and the representation of feminism on prime-time television, shows how the series was reconfigured as a 'woman's program,' and investigates questions of female spectatorship and feminist readings. Although she focuses on Cagney and Lacey, D'Acci discusses many other examples from the history of American television.

The first survey of Richard Avedon's influential advertising work Richard Avedon was one of the most sought-after and influential advertising photographers in America from the 1940s to the beginning of the 21st century, creating work that exemplified Madison Avenue at the height of its influence in world culture. Working with a talented cadre of models, copy writers, and art directors, Avedon made images that enticed consumers to embrace the new, especially in the areas of fashion and beauty, with campaigns for Revlon, Chanel, Calvin Klein, Dior, and Versace, among many others. Avedon Advertising tells this story, reproducing memorable ads that range from the buoyant 1940s and 1950s, when post-war prosperity opened up new experiences to consumers; through the explosive '60s; and into the era defined by celebrity culture and global brand awareness.