This is the cover of Vogue from 1950 with model Jean Pachet done by the famous photographer Irving Penn. He was inseparable from Vogue for almost 70 years and made more than 150 covers for the magazine influencing fashion perceptions of many Americans and the industry as a whole.
Irving Penn studied under Alexey Brodovitch at the Pennsylvania Museum School of Industrial Art (now the University of the Arts) from which he was graduated in 1938. Penn’s drawings were published by Harper’s Bazaar and he also painted. As his career in photography blossomed, he became known for post World War II feminine chic and glamour photography.
Penn worked for many years doing fashion photography for Vogue magazine, founding his own studio in 1953. He was among the first photographers to pose subjects against a simple grey or white backdrop and used this simplicity more effectively than other photographers. Posing his subjects within this tight, unorthodox space, Penn brought an unprecedented sense of drama to his portraits, driving the viewer’s focus onto the person and their expression. In many photos, the subjects appeared wedged into the corner. Subjects photographed with this technique included Martha Graham, Marcel Duchamp, Pablo Picasso, Georgia O’Keeffe, W. H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky and Marlene Dietrich. (Coming soon…;)
He IS fashion photography.