Baron Adolph de Meyer was a photographer. He was also the first official fashion photographer for the American magazine Vogue. He was a representative of the style of Pictorialism.
Background
Ethnicity:
Adolph de Meyer had a German Jewish father and Scottish mother.
De Meyer was born in Paris, France, on September 1, 1868. He was the son of Adolphus Louis and Adele Meyer (Watson).
Education
Adolph de Meyer started to interest in photography at an early age. He was educated in Dresden, Germany.
Career
De Meyer relocated from Dresden to London in 1895. Between 1898 and 1913 he resided in fashionable Cadogan Gardens, London, and from 1903 to 1907 his artworks were published in Alfred Stieglitz's quarterly Camera Work. In 1903, de Meyer got in touch with Alfred Stieglitz and became associated with the Photo-Secession.
He photographed Vaslav Nijinsky, the greatest male dancer of the early 20th century, and other members of Diaghilev’s "Ballets Russes" when "L’après-midi d’un faune" opened in Paris in 1912. In his numerous photos of Nijinsky, de Meyer captured not only the similarity and subtlety of the Russian danseur noble, but also transported the viewer into Nijinsky’s world of fantasy and grace.
On the onset of the First World War, de Meyer moved with his wife to New York City, where Adolph de Meyer’s first photograph was published in Vogue magazine. In 1914 publisher Condé Nast appointed de Meyer as Vogue magazine’s first full-time photographer, concurrently working for Vanity Fair. He held his position in Vogue until 1921.
When de Meyer began working at Vogue, there was not yet a genre called "fashion photography", models and clothes had been mostly represented through drawings. De Meyer was instrumental in introducing the new style, and his fashion photographs became known for their bold use of fabrics, soft focus, and for the lifeless, statue-like quality in which he rendered his models.
In 1922 the artist became the Harper's Bazaar chief photographer in Paris, spending the next 16 years there. After his travels in Europe, he relocated to the United States. In 1938, Adolph de Meyer settled in Hollywood. Today, only a few of his prints survive, most having been destroyed during the Second World War.
Adolph de Meyer joined the Royal Photographic Society in 1893.
Royal Photographic Society
,
United Kingdom
1893
Interests
Artists
Gustav Klimt
Connections
On June 25, 1899, de Meyer married Olga Caracciolo at Holy Trinity Church, Sloane Street, Cadogan Square, in London, England. Caracciolo was an Italian noblewoman and this was the second marriage for her. However, it must be noted that the de Meyers' marriage was one of convenience rather than romantic love, as they were both homosexual.
As Adolph de Meyer wrote in his unpublished autobiographical novel, before they got married, he explained to Olga Caracciolo that "the real meaning of love shorn of any kind of sensuality". He continued, "Marriage based too much on love and unrestrained passion has rarely a chance to be lasting, whilst perfect understanding and companionship, on the contrary, generally make the most durable union."
In 1916 the de Meyers took the new names of Mahrah and Gayne, on the advice of an astrologer. His wife died in 1931, and Baron Adolph de Meyer became romantically involved with a young German, Ernest Frohlich. At first, de Meyer hired him as a chauffeur and later adopted as his son. He became named Baron Ernest Frohlich de Meyer.