A unique collaboration between Bernheimer Fine Art Photography and Trinity House Paintings brings together the work of Paul César Helleu (1859 - 1927) and Cathleen Naundorf (b. 1968) for a special exhibition dedicated to glamour and fashion timed to coincide with New York Fashion Week. This extraordinary collection of works on paper and photography celebrates beauty, glamour and all things fabulous from two of the western world's most captivating artists crossing over 100 years of haute couture.  The exhibition runs from 13-29 September 2012. On the preview evening (Wednesday, 12th September), Cathleen Naundorf will be available to meet guests and to sign copies of her book Haute Couture –The Polaroids of Cathleen Naundorf.

Cathleen Naundorf, is a celebrated fashion photographer who originally studied her craft in Munich and has since worked across the globe.  From 1997, she had her own fashion page in Süddeutsche Zeitung as well as commissions for Glamour and Vogue to take pictures backstage at the Paris fashion shows.  Since 2005, Cathleen Naundorf has worked on her haute couture series “Un rêve de mode” focusing on six couture houses: Chanel, Dior, Gaultier, Lacroix, Elie Saab and Valentino.

Thanks to her outstanding and unique pictures, Cathleen Naundorf has virtually unlimited access to the couturiers’ archives and is able to choose gowns for her elaborate and cinematic productions. In addition Naundorf is painstaking in her choice of location, set-up, models, and hair and make-up designers. All of these careful preparations are preceded by intensive research, which Cathleen Naundorf records in enchanting handmade journals in order to develop a storyboard: archive photos of couturiers, texts written by Naundorf and others as well as sketches of planned photo compositions.

Cathleen Naundorf is passionately committed to large format cameras for her work (Deardorff or Plaubel). The expensive Polaroid films with the format 4 x 5 und 8 x 10 inches, many of which are out of production, are unique items the photographer uses as a homage to the exceptional quality of the haute couture dresses. This exhibition presents collectors and first time buyers the opportunity to attain a breath-taking work or art.

Paul César Helleu (1859 - 1927) worked as a painter and an engraver in France at the turn of 20th century. He was renowned for his incredibly assured portrait commissions, becoming one of the most sought after artists by American high society. He studied at the École Nationale des Beaux-Arts where he befriended fellow student John Singer Sargent. Sargent and Helleu were both profoundly influenced by the impressionists with Helleu being invited to exhibit with the group in 1886 but choosing not to on the advice of his friend Claude Monet.

In 1886, Helleu befriended Robert de Montesquiou, the poet and aesthete, who introduced Helleu to Parisian literary salons, where he met Marcel Proust, who later became a friend, as well as Montesquiou’s cousin, the Countess Greffulhe. This enabled Helleu to successfully expand his career as a portrait artist to the elegant and fashionable women in the highest ranks of Parisian society, for which he is now most renowned. His noteworthy subjects include the Duchess of Marlborough, the Marchesa Casati, Belle da Costa Greene, Madeleine Chéruit, and Helena Rubenstein.

From 1901 Helleu was at the heart of the couture scene, fraternising with the period's top designers; Felix, Jacques, Doucet and Charles Frederick Worth (founder of Paris Haute couture), who used the artist’s ideas and themes in his collections. Helleu is also known to have influenced Coco Chanel's distinctive use of beige by drawing her attention to the colour and impression of sand whilst at Deauville beach together. 

Helleu’s creative influence found its way to the United States, and in particular New York, which he visited on three occasions. In 1912, he was awarded the commission to design the ceiling decoration in New York City's Grand Central Station. He created a mural depicting a blue-green night sky covered by the starry signs of the zodiac. In the 1930’s the mural was covered up but more than sixty years later, in 1998, it was completely restored and millions of visitors and passengers at the station still marvel at Helleu's ceiling mural.