Edward Steichen in High Fashion

Book excerpt: "Steichen was already a famous painter and photographer on both sides of the Atlantic when, in early 1923, he was offered one of the most prestigious positions, and certainly the most lucrative, in photography's commercial domain, that of chief photographer for Conde Nast's influential and highly regarded magazines Vogue and Vanity Fair. Over the next fifteen years. Steichen produced a body of work of unequaled brilliance, putting his exceptional talents and prodigious energies to work dramatizing and glamorizing contemporary culture and its achievers, in politics, literature, sports, dance, theater, opera, and, above all, the world of high fashion." "The Steichen archive at Conde Nast contains more than 2000 original prints. Several of the images are well known, prominently featured in various histories of photographs. Until now, however, no more than a handful of these prints has been exhibited or published. The 1920s and 1930s represent the high point in Steichen's photographic career, and the work he did for Vogue and Vanity Fair encompasses some of the most striking creations of twentieth-century photography."--BOOK JACKET.