LECTURE

Please join Fashion Studies Alliance and Fashion Research Network for a co-sponsored lecture by John-Michael O'Sullivan, Turning the Page:  the American Magazine at Midcentury.

In January 1950, Vogue put an Erwin Blumenfeld photograph of Jean Patchett on its cover. With its combination of elegance, attitude and drama, it has become an enduring, definitive image of its time. But Vogue represented only a single facet of a far more complex picture. The midcentury newsstand was a diverse, intensely competitive marketplace, reflecting a kaleidoscopic view of midcentury lifestyle, culture and attitudes. From high-fashion to teenager, and from mainstream to avant-garde, this talk will explore the conflicting visions of America presented by magazines at the start of a brave new decade. It will also look at magazine covers from January 1950 in the context of their creators — both those behind, and in front of, the camera.