A look into Richard Avedon’s Harpers Bazaar ‘Dovima with elephants’

Dovima with elephants, evening dress by Dior, Cirque d’Hiver, Paris, August 1955

This is a photograph taken by a famous fashion photographer Richard Avedon in 1955 for harpers bazaar winter collection. Richard Avedon captured this image by using a eight by ten camera that had a fixed lens and cropped images from the sizes making images the centre of attention.

It is one of the most famous, glamourous fashion photographs not only of the 1950’s but of all time. The model Dorthey most known as Davina was a famous model in the 1950’s. Avedon was most known to take photographs outside of the studio with models and was not very typical in the 90’s and also in todays modern photography is still considered as very exotic and containing elements of theatrical exuberance. He made many prints of his photographs to sell in different sizes however he was not particularly proud of this photograph because he thought that he should have put a fan near the vail on the models dress to produce more movement in the photograph personally I think it would not have been as iconic because the image was taken as a portrait and the models body language is very strong and stable making it seem more powerful therefore movement in the picture in my eyes would have made the image less powerful and taken it would have away the element of stability in the models pose.

A lot of fashion photographs taken in the 1950’s were not very adventurous or progressive in terms of fashion. Many of the photos taken in that time were usually portraits taken from shoulder up and did not exude a lot of energy which is why Avedon is an iconic photographer in todays sociality he was also very ahead of his time in sense of creativity.

What we see in this image is a sense of communication in her shoulders and arms because she seems to be leaning on the elephants trunk with her right hand and on the elephants ear on the other. You can also see that her pale white skin has a high contrast and the black dress and also the grey elephants. It can also state youth and old age between the elephants and the model because Davina was relatively young in this photograph and the elephants were very old. Elephants are also considered very powerful and wise in many cultures.

There is almost a very shallow depth of filed in the image because it focuses mainly on the model and clothing and slightly blurs out the elephants and surrounding. Avedon shot this as a portrait which I personally think was the best way to capture the power and energy in this picture. The lines in Davina’s body language and the elephants wrinkles come together very well and slightly give a sense of direction on where to look in the image.

Also by analysing the elephants pose and the models pose you can see that Davina has a strong confident pose and the elephants pose seem almost vulnerable because they have their feet above the ground. It could also symbolise freedom and captivity because the elephants feet are chained to the ground whereas the model upper body seems to almost be floating in the air.

The image is not only very important to the photography industry but it is also for the fashion industry because the dress that Divina is wearing is the first dress designed by 19 year old assistant Eve Saint Laurent which is a very successful fashion business today.

The composition in this picture is very aesthetically pleasing and striking but it is the drama and excitement in it is what makes it so inspirational and creative.