Horst at the V&A

Mainbocher Corset (pink satin corset by Detolle), Paris, 1939. © Condé Nast/Horst Estate

Whilst visiting the V&A last week I learnt about an upcoming exhibition on Horst this September which I am looking forward to seeing. I have often seen his prints at Paris Photo and they are always printed beautifully. His most iconic images were printed in platinum/palladium and he even some on linen, something that I have never tried but would be interesting to see what affect it had. Mapplethorpe also printed some images on linen when he was alive, although I have yet to view them in person.

Lisa Hat and Gloves,Horst, Platinum/Palladium,1951

To see some more of his work the Vogue archive curated a selection of Horst’s platinum prints on Artsy which you can view here

Further information

-Horst: Photographer of Style

This autumn the V&A will present the definitive retrospective of the work of Horst P. Horst (1906-99), one of the 20th century’s master photographers. In a career that spanned six decades, Horst photographed the exquisite creations of couturiers such as Chanel, Schiaparelli and Vionnet in 1930s Paris, and helped to launch the careers of many models. In New York a decade later, he experimented with early colour techniques and his meticulously composed, artfully lit images leapt from the magazine page.

The exhibition will display Horst’s best known photographs alongside unpublished and rarely exhibited vintage prints, conveying the diversity of his output, from surreal still lifes to portraits of Hollywood stars, nudes and nature studies to documentary pictures of the Middle East. It will examine his creative process through archive film footage, original contact sheets, sketchbooks and letters and will include a recreation of Horst’s 1940s studio.

– Collecting Horst