Living Colour

Yevonde was not only a pioneer of colour photography but also a champion of female emancipation. A new exhibition celebrates her groundbreaking work

The life of Yevonde Middleton, known also as Madame Yevonde or simply Yevonde, was colourful in every sense of the word. “A bold innovator who defined what it means to see and be seen,” is how Yana Peel, Global Head of Arts and Culture at Chanel, describes the late generational photography talent, a pioneer of her craft who is credited with changing the direction of portraiture through her innovative use of colour.

The Chanel Culture Fund has partnered with London’s National Portrait Gallery — reopening on June 22 after the most extensive renovation in its long history — to present Yevonde: Life and Colour, a major exhibition dedicated to the photographer’s catalogue of acclaimed work across a 60-year career.

The exhibition is curated by Clare Freestone, who is in no doubt as to what was distinctive about Yevonde’s style. “The way her unique and vivacious personality infused her work. The way that she was always seeking to innovate. She experimented with technique and threw her ideas at the process, which, because it was complex, could have been prohibitive for some.”

Born in south London in 1893 to a prosperous family, Yevonde’s early passion was the suffragette movement, an activist organisation she joined upon returning to the UK from studying abroad. Although she left it — apparently not in tune with its militant tactics — its spirit never left her, fueling her belief that “to be independent was the greatest thing in life” and propelling her towards photography, a career she felt could offer both financial and professional independence — if successful.

To ensure that would be the case, Yevonde set about learning from the best, taking an apprenticeship at the Mayfair studio of Lallie Charles, the

These page, clockwise from left: Lady Dorothy Warrender as Ceres, by Yevonde (1935), given by the photographer, 1971; Dorothy Gisborne (Pratt) as Psyche, by Yevonde (1935), purchased with support from the Portrait Fund, 2021; Edward James, by Yevonde (1933), purchased with support from the Portrait Fund, 2021. All images © National Portrait Gallery, London Opposite page: self-portrait with Vivex One-Shot Camera, by Yevonde (1937), purchased with support from the Portrait Fund, 2021 © National Portrait Gallery, London leading society photographer of the day, from whom she gleaned knowledge of how best to handle aristocratic and sophisticated clients while also developing her practical skills.

“When Yevonde left Lallie Charles’ studio, she understood that her tutor’s style – soft ‘Edwardian’ flattery – was on the way out,” says Freestone. At a time when women were growing more independent, Yevonde decided to set up on her own, taking a loan from her father to purchase expensive premises in central London. “However, she had only taken one photograph with Charles and so she set about experimenting,” continues Freestone. “Her early studies do emulate Charles, but it is not long before she is trying more spare and strong compositions, also dabbling in Pictorialism, with work published in Photograms of the Year.

“When colour came onto the scene her imagination really took off, and Surrealism fused with sheer experimentation influences her style.”

Commercial colour photography became increasingly important during the 1930s and one process of printing reigned supreme: Vivex. It employed three negative plates — cyan, magenta and yellow, for the full colour range — which were exposed and processed separately, giving Yevonde the freedom to indulge in different forms of colour manipulation.

“The Vivex process, and the equipment required to make a successful print, is extensive,” says Freestone, “Although prints were made at the first colour lab for professional photographers in the UK, Yevonde had to ensure that she followed steps in order for a decent print to be achieved. She understood this process well and pushed and manipulated it. Enough for the Vivex printers to complain about heavy greens or blues. But this was exactly what she wanted to achieve — she wanted to upset the balance!”

Addressing the Royal Photographic Society in 1932, the first woman to do so, Yevonde made this desire clear: “If we are going to have colour photographs, for heaven’s sake let’s have a riot of colour, none of your wishy washy hand-tinted effects.”

Following extensive research, Yevonde: Life and Colour will feature many new discoveries from the photographer’s oeuvre, including a range of sitters and subjects – debutantes and royals, writers and movie stars – captured in vibrant colour. They include one of the most photographed women of the 1930s, Margaret Sweeny, who would later become embroiled in one of Britain’s most notorious divorce cases after assuming the title of Duchess of Argyll. Also featured is a previously unseen self-portrait from 1937, captured in her trademark vivid tricolour alongside her outsized one-shot camera.

It is her sittings with the era’s leading socialites that account for Yevonde’s most pioneering series of colour portraits. Titled Goddesses, it saw these prominent female figures adopt the guises of classical myth, including Dorothy, Duchess of Wellington as Hecate, Lady Anne Rhys as the goddess Flora, and Lady Milbanke as Penthelisa, Queen of the Amazons.

“Many of the sitters were regulars at Yevonde’s studio, others were friends or acquaintances,” says Freestone. “Some had a costume in readiness from a fancy dress ball held earlier in 1935, and all would have entered into this collaboration believing it to be great fun, I am sure.

“Yevonde’s photographs had been receiving attention since her first solo exhibition in 1932. I’m sure that the offer to portray a powerful woman from mythology would have appealed to these great beauties, of varied and interesting lives, and dressing up and colourful fashion were very much in vogue. The artistic results were reviewed as ‘startling’; who wouldn’t want to be depicted in this way?”

One surprising new discovery unearthed during research is an addition to Goddesses. The previously unknown element of the series depicts Dorothy Gisborne (Pratt) as Psyche, Greek goddess of the soul, complete with butterfly wings.

“Yevonde’s originality demonstrated through these photographs traverses almost a century and provides a vision so fresh and relatable,” enthuses Freestone. ‘It is enthralling.”

Yevonde’s motto was “be original or die”. Having studied her work so intently, does Freestone believe she lived to this maxim? “She certainly did. This statement was in response to the threat to studio photography in the 1930s, due to the increased demand for reportage and competition from department store photographers. She understood that fashion changed and that photography should reflect and capture the zeitgeist. She called for innovation, and her work is testament that she practised what she preached.”