Lee Miller in Jean Cocteau’s film, The Blood of a Poet

“Only sculpture would give account of the beauty of her shapely lips, of her big, pale, and languid eyes, and of her neck, similar to a column”, writes Cecil Beaton in Vogue, in 1960. Introduced to photography by her father, Lee Miller (1907– 1977) makes her debut as a model for Vogue in the United States, in 1927. She poses, in particular, for Edward Steichen, prior to departing for Paris, determined to become a photographer. She becomes not only Man Ray’s assistant, but also his model, and his Egeria from 1929 to 1931. Then, she opens her own fashion photographic studio, working for Patou, Schiaparelli and Chanel. During the Second World War, she works for press and produces, in April, 1945, some of the most memorable images of the Liberation, by General Patton’s troops, of the Dachau and Buchenwald concentration camps. In 1947, she marries Roland Penrose, a British Surrealist painter, and abandons photography.