Norma Stevens - Avedon: Something Personal

First, we wish to thank our good friends Natalie Robins and Christopher Lehmann-Haupt whose inspired idea it was to put us together as co-authors.

We thank all those who spoke to us about Richard Avedon: Renata Adler, Vince Aletti, Ruth Ansel, Pierre Apraxine, Amy Arbus, Lisa Atkin, Nadja Auermann, Elizabeth Cox Avedon, Luke Avedon, Dr. Nathan Averick, Lauren Bacall, Bill Bachmann, David Bailey, Nelson Bakerman, Franois-Marie Banier, Jed Bark, Stephen Barker, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Peter Beard, Paul Beck, Magosia Bela, Shari Belafonte, Marisa Berenson, Rosamond Bernier, Jamie Bernstein, Iris Bianchi, Andrea Blanch, Koto Bolofo, Julie Britt, Sandy Buchsbaum, Chris Callis, Naomi Campbell, Oribe Canales, Drew Carolan, Paul Cavaco, Susan Chieco, Arthur Cohen, Cindy Crawford, Billy Cunningham, Yolanda Cuomo, Kitty DAlessio, Mike Davis, Carlyne Cerf de Dudzeele, Garren DeFazio, John Delaney, Grant Delin, Carmen DellOrefice, Raymond DeMoulin, Janice Dickinson, Pamela Dillman, Jeremy Dine, Shelley Dowell, Nina Drapacz, Ingrid Drotman, Frederick Eberstadt, Owen Edwards, Deborah Eisenberg, John Enos, Linda Evangelista, Harris Feinn, Frances FitzGerald, Eileen Ford, Jeffrey Fraenkel, Michael Frankfurt, Kevin Funabashi, Sarah Funke, Robert Gabriel, Peter Galassi, Maggy Geiger, Sarah Giles, Ann Giordano, Richard Gluckman, Kara Glynn, Adam Gopnik, Jill Graham, Francine du Plessix Gray, Amy Greene, Joshua Greene, Andre Gregory, John Gruen, Jerry Hall, Maria Morris Hambourg, Willis Hartshorn, Nicholas Haslam, Ashton Hawkins, Simon Head, Dr. Lauren Helm, Maxine Henryson, Brian Hetherington, Lizzie Himmel, Hiro, Jane Stanton Hitchcock, Jade Hobson, Ruedi Hofmann, Nancy Hoving, Colta Ives, Junichi Izumi, Barbara Jakobson, Dawn and Ed Johann, James Kaliardos, Helen Kanelous, Julie Kavanagh, Dodie Kazanjian, Dirk Kikstra, Sebastian Kim, Calvin Klein, Susan Graham Kraus, Evelyn Kuhn, John Lahr, Jeanne Landwehr, Jennifer Landwehr, Professor Irving Lavin, June Leaf, Kelly Le Brock, David Leddick, John Post Lee, Robert Lee, Dr. Steven Lee, Estelle Lefbure, Gideon Lewin, David Liittschwager, Marguerite Lamkin Littman, Jane Livingston, Stanley Lobel, Alicia Grant Longwell, Santo Loquasto, Doc Losee, Jonathan Losee, Mark Lyon, Peter MacGill, China Machado, Alen MacWeeney, Edoardo Mantelli, Daymion Mardel, Patricia Marx, Harvey Mattison, Pamela Maffei McCarthy, Marc McClish, Patricia Knack McKay, Joe McKenna, Polly Mellen, Paul Meyer, Marlene Meyerson, Charles Michener, Diana Michener, Caterine Milinaire, Dr. Robert Millman, Grace Mirabella, Isaac Mizrahi, Ben Monk, Maura Moynihan, Barry Munger, Weston Naef, Kaz Nakamura, Mike Nichols, Susan Copen Oken, Cynthia ONeal, Guido Palau, Claude Picasso, Robert J. Reicher, David Remnick, Kerry Roland, Barbara Rose, Jeff Rose, Camilla Rosenfeld, David Ross, Peggy Ross, Isabella Rossellini, Marc Royce, Rene Russo, Nicoletta Santoro, Ellen Schwamm, Penny Cobbs Sepler, Sam Shahid, Mary Shanahan, Wallace Shawn, Ellie Shearing, Brooke Shields, Anney Siegel-Wamsat, Barbara Sinatra, Stephen Sondheim, David Spear, Tony Spinelli, Carol Squiers, Kenneth Starr, Earl Steinbicker, Cameron Sterling, Alfred R. Stern, Peggy Stern, Martin Stevens, Max Stevens, Molly Stevens, Robert Stevens, Robin Tattersall, Stella Tennant, Twyla Tharp, Judith Thurman, Jennifer Tipton, Brian Tolle, Eileen Travell, Penelope Tree, Deborah Turbeville, Patricia Avedon Turk, Christy Turlington, Shonna Valeska, Amber Valletta, Jim Varriale, Donatella Versace, Veruschka von Lehndorff, Tim Walker, Nick Waplington, Bruce Weber, Marla Weinhoff, Jane Wenner, Jann Wenner, Richard Wheatcroft, Helen Whitney, Laura Wilson, Nicole Wisniak, Meg Wolitzer, and Michael Wright.

Thanks also to Larry J. Abowitz, Francie Alexander, Christopher and Jean Angell, Barbara Bachman, Nejma Beard, Sally Berman, Ashley Bete, Frish Brandt, Annie Chagnot, Mengfei Chen, Gerald Clarke, Dr. Frances Cohen, Ann Dexter-Jones, Diana Dyjak Montes de Oca, Susan Forristal, Jonathan Frembling, Philippe Garner, Aaron Richard Golub, Julie Grau, Pat Hackett, Jerome F. Hamlin, Pierre Henry, Stephan Johansson, Alan Kleinberg, Vincent La Scala, Peter Lev, William LoTurco, Matthew Martin, James R. Mellon, Vivian Mellon, Greg Mollica, Patricia Patterson, Robert M. Pennoyer, Jeff L. Rosenheim, Paul Roth, Mary Carroll Scott, Patty Sicular, John Silvis, Jillian Suarez, Georgia Thoreau La Salle, Nancy Tilghman, Patricia and Robert Volland, Shelley Wanger, and Margaret Zoller.

We are greatly indebted to Jennifer Kinney, Rachel Valinsky, and Ariella Wolens, who were extraordinarily resourceful at finding whatever was needed to clarify the picture. We remain grateful to our wise and enterprising agent, David Kuhn. And finally, no one deserves more gratitude and praise than our editor and publisher, Celina Spiegel, who nurtured this project every step of the way, with good humor, good taste, and unfailingly sound judgment.

N ORMA S TEVENS was a copywriter and creative director in advertising when Richard Avedon wooed her to become his studio director in 1976. She collaborated with him on all his commercial, editorial, and fine-art projects and traveled the world with him for his ad campaigns and museum exhibitions. At his death, in 2004, she became the founding executive director of the Richard Avedon Foundation, which she led for five years. She is a longtime board member of the Twyla Tharp Dance Foundation.

S TEVEN M . L . A RONSON met Richard Avedon in 1970, and their paths continued to cross throughout Avedons life. A former book editor and publisher, he is the author of Hype and the co-author of the Edgar Awardwinning Savage Grace. He contributed the biographical section to the collectors edition of the work of the photographer Peter Beard. His profiles, interviews, and articles have appeared in Vanity Fair, Vogue, New York, Esquire, The Village Voice, Architectural Digest, Poetry,Interview, and The Nation.

New Years Eve 1975. My husband and I were having a few friends over for a champagne toast. Martin was the worldwide creative director of Revlon at the time and had invited to drop byshould he have nothing better to dohis go-to photographer for big splashy four-color lips and matching fingertips ad campaigns (Fire and Ice, Persian Melon, Cherries in the Snow, Stormy Pink, Wine with Everything). A little before midnight Richard Avedonthe ne-plus-ultra arbiter of feminine grace and beauty, the ambassador of glamour, the epitome of chicburst through our front door bearing a dozen American Beauty roses, which he presented to me with romantic-comedy panache, fanning them out as if he were showing his hand in a card game. You shouldnt have, I said, but now I think Id be disappointed if you hadnt.

It was an entrancea performanceworthy of Fred Astaire. And why not, I thought, since Astaires character in the film Funny Face had been modeled on him. I remember what he had on that night: lavender silk shirt, skinny black knitted tie, dove-gray double-breasted suit fitted to his wiry frame. And behind the horn-rimmed glasses, those black mile-a-minute pinwheel eyes! And then the crowning gloryhis untamed mane of silvery hair.

After Id introduced him to our other guests, he pulled me aside and said, Ive got to talk to you. Where can we go?