JEAN-MARIE PÉRIER
Jean-Marie Périer was born in 1940 in Paris to the family of actress Jacqueline Porel and actor François Périer. Through his father, Jean-Marie became acquainted with Daniel Filipacchi, a Marie Claire photographer who later became a well-known publisher and art collector. Filipacchi hired Périer as his personal assistant, and in 1962, he offered the young man the chance to work at the popular youth magazine Salut Les Copains, which profiled the greatest musical icons of that time, including the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Johnny Hallyday, Jacques Dutronc, Sylvie Vartan, and Françoise Hardy, just to name a few. Périer worked at Salut Les Copains for 12 years. Starting in 1974, Jean-Marie Périer began to pay more attention to commercial photography and cinematography. In 1980, he left to work in the United States. After a long break in his photographic career, he returned to France in the 1990s and was invited by ELLE to shoot a series of portraits entitled ‘The World of Fashion Designers.’ This series featured the photos of such prominent designers as Yves Saint Laurent, Jean Paul Gaultier, John Galliano, Vivienne Westwood, Karl Lagerfeld, and Roberto Cavalli. Périer shot photographic portraits of world cinema stars as well, including Catherine Deneuve, Alain Delon, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Benicio Del Toro, Sophia Loren, Monica Bellucci, and Natalie Portman. His photographs have been exhibited in museums and galleries around the globe, including in the USA (Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco in 2008, Portland Museum and Brooklyn Museum, both in 2009), Germany (Stephen Hoffman Gallery in 2008), Belgium (Young Galerie in 2007), and Great Britain (Snap Galleries in 2006 and The Little Black Gallery in 2017). As the photographer of famous portraits of musical, cinema, and fashion stars, Jean-Marie Périer worked for best-selling magazines and brands and created an impressive gallery of celebrities of the twentieth century.
“YVES SAINT-LAURENT IN HIS PARIS FLAT, WITH SIBYL BUCK, 1995”
80X100 CM FUJICOLOR CRYSTAL ARCHIVE PAPER DIGITAL TYPE DPII, MOUNTED ON DIBOND PANEL EDITION 5/10 PRINTED 2018
The portrait of Yves Saint Laurent was taken in his Paris apartment on rue de Babylone. This composition, with the main character in the background in the left corner of the photo, is rather typical for Périer. Sibyl Buck, the model, is in a black Yves Saint Laurent dress. This image can be called an unique photographic document because it captured the interior where the designer lived for a long time. This apartment was styled with the assistance of Jacques Grange, a connoisseur of decorative arts. Following his advice, Yves Saint Laurent built an impressive collection of 20th century objets d’art, furniture, and design articles. The focal point of the room is ‘Le profil noir’ (‘A Black Profile’), a 1928 painting by Fernand Léger, a famous French painter, sculptor, and master of decorative arts. On the right is a magnificent vase created in 1925 by Swiss sculptor Jean Dunant. Yves Saint Laurent freely combined these objets d’art in his interior with Renaissance bronze, Rococo furniture of the 18th century, and household and decorative items of Ancient Egypt. After his death, the Yves Saint Laurent collection was sold at a Christie’s auction for more than 400 million dollars. It was the biggest auction ever held in Europe. Later, his apartment was sold as well, and now the luxurious interiors of this great fashion designer can only be seen in this photo. © Jean-Marie Périer
“KARL LAGERFELD, HAMBURG, MAY, 1995”
A wide black umbrella provides shelter from the snow for Karl Lagerfeld, a famous clothes designer and artistic director of the Chanel fashion house from 1983 to 2019. Back in 1995, Lagerfeld had a castle in Hamburg where he tried to spend all his free time. Périer referred to him as an amazing man who knew how to turn pleasure into work, and work into passion. Polite and disciplined, he was able to combine several parallel lives and personalities. © Jean-Marie Périer
“VALENTINO GARAVANI IN HIS HOME, ROME, 1996”
50X60 CM FUJICOLOR CRYSTAL ARCHIVE PAPER DIGITAL TYPE DPII, MOUNTED ON DIBOND PANEL EDITION 2/15 PRINTED 2018 SIGNED ON LABEL BY THE AUTHOR
This photo shows fashion designer Valentino Garavani in his own house in Rome, surrounded by his favorite interior design pieces. More like a couturier than a photographer, Périer meticulously arranges an image that reflects the personality and mood of his subject. © Jean-Marie Périer
“THE BEATLES. CIGARETTES. PARIS, MARCH 1964”
80X120 CM FUJICOLOR CRYSTAL ARCHIVE PAPER DIGITAL TYPE DPII, MOUNTED ON DIBOND PANEL EDITION 4/10 PRINTED 2018 SIGNED ON LABEL BY THE AUTHOR
For this photo, Jean-Marie Périer asked the Beatles members to line up and gave each of them a cigarette and a lighter. Then he told his assistant to turn off the lights in the studio. When Périer heard giggles in the dark, he asked the musicians to flick the lighters on and hold them up to the cigarettes as if to light them. He took no more than three shots, asked his assistant to turn on the lights, and thanked everyone for their work. They were all stunned to realize that the photo session was finished so quickly. This experience gave Périer the opportunity to work with the band and photograph them during their concert tours in the future. © Jean-Marie Périer