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Gagosian is pleased to announce Seeing Is Believing: Lee Miller and Friends, opening on November 11 at 976 Madison Avenue, New York. The exhibition centers on the long, fruitful relationship between American photographer Lee Miller (1907–1977) and English Surrealist painter, collector, art historian, and Picasso biographer, Roland Penrose (1900–1984). In addition to photographs by Miller and Penrose, it will feature paintings, sculptures, photographs, and works on paper by Joseph Cornell, Max Ernst, Dora Maar, Man Ray, Henry Moore, Valentine Penrose, and Pablo Picasso—all artists in their extended network. Curated by Jason Ysenburg and Richard Calvocoressi, Seeing Is Believing also presents letters, albums, and ephemera that trace a history of interconnected lives and relationships.

As a model for American Vogue in the 1920s, Miller was photographed by leading fashion and portrait photographers before traveling to Paris to study with Man Ray. She developed a uniquely Surrealist vision of portraiture and captured many arresting images as a correspondent during World War II. Penrose co-organized the 1936 International Surrealist Exhibition that introduced the movement to the United Kingdom, cofounded London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts in 1946, and curated important retrospectives of Picasso and Man Ray.

Summering in the South of France in the 1930s, moving to London at the outbreak of World War II, traveling in the United States after the war, and relocating to East Sussex in 1949, Miller and Penrose cultivated enduring connections with key artists and writers, playing a vital role in the culture of their era. With an emphasis on Surrealism, Seeing Is Believing paints a picture of the creative life the couple shared with their friends.

#LeeMiller

Artists

Press

Gagosian
press@gagosian.com

Hallie Freer
hfreer@gagosian.com
+1 212 744 2313

Polskin Arts
Meagan Jones
meagan.jones@finnpartners.com
+1 212 593 6485

A Flat on Rue Victor-Considerant

A Flat on Rue Victor-Considerant

Lee Miller and Tanja Ramm’s friendship took them from New York to Paris and back, in front of and behind many cameras, and into the Surrealist avant-garde. Here, Gagosian director Richard Calvocoressi speaks with Ramm’s daughter, art historian Margit Rowell, about discovering her mother’s early life, her memories of Miller, and the collaborative work of photographers and models.

Lee Miller and Friends

Lee Miller and Friends

The American Surrealist photographer Lee Miller is the subject of the exhibition Seeing Is Believing at Gagosian, New York. Here we present a conversation on the stewardship of Miller’s legacy, her photography and writing from the frontlines of war to the pages of Vogue, and the intertwined lives of her friends, lovers, and the many artists she knew.

A Foreigner Called Picasso

Behind the Art
A Foreigner Called Picasso

Join president of the Picasso Museum, Paris, Cécile Debray; curator, writer, biographer, and historian Annie Cohen-Solal; art historian Vérane Tasseau; and Gagosian director Serena Cattaneo Adorno as they discuss A Foreigner Called Picasso. Organized in association with the Musée national Picasso–Paris and the Palais de la Porte Dorée–Musée national de l’histoire de l’immigration, Paris, the exhibition reframes our perception of Picasso and focuses on his status as a permanent foreigner in France.

A Foreigner Called Picasso

A Foreigner Called Picasso

Cocurator of the exhibition A Foreigner Called Picasso, at Gagosian, New York, Annie Cohen-Solal writes about the genesis of the project, her commitment to the figure of the outsider, and Picasso’s enduring relevance to matters geopolitical and sociological.

Fashion and Art: Pieter Mulier

Fashion and Art: Pieter Mulier

Pieter Mulier, creative director of Alaïa, presented his second collection for the legendary house in Paris in January 2022. After the presentation, Mulier spoke with Derek Blasberg about the show’s inspirations, including a series of ceramics by Pablo Picasso, and about his profound reverence for the intimacy and artistry of the atelier.

The Art of Biography: Sir John Richardson’s “The Minotaur Years”

The Art of Biography: Sir John Richardson’s “The Minotaur Years”

Pepe Karmel celebrates the release of A Life of Picasso IV: The Minotaur Years, 1933–1943, the final installment of Sir John Richardson’s magisterial biography.

For Sale: Baby Shoes. Never Worn.

For Sale: Baby Shoes. Never Worn.

Sydney Stutterheim meditates on the power and possibilities of small-format artworks throughout time.

Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler

Game Changer
Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler

Michael Cary pays homage to the visionary dealer Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler (1884–1979).

Grace McCann Morley

Game Changer
Grace McCann Morley

Berit Potter pays homage to the ardent museum leader who transformed San Francisco’s relationship to modern art.

Gagosian Quarterly Spring 2020

Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Spring 2020

The Spring 2020 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring Cindy Sherman’s Untitled #412 (2003) on its cover.

The New World of Charlotte Perriand

The New World of Charlotte Perriand

Inspired by a visit to the Fondation Louis Vuitton’s exhibition Charlotte Perriand: Inventing a New World, William Middleton explores the life of this modernist pioneer and her impact on the worlds of design, art, and architecture.

Picasso and Maya: An Interview with Diana Widmaier-Ruiz-Picasso

Picasso and Maya: An Interview with Diana Widmaier-Ruiz-Picasso

Diana Widmaier-Ruiz-Picasso curated an exhibition at Gagosian, Paris, in 2017–18 titled Picasso and Maya: Father and Daughter. To celebrate the exhibition, a publication was published in 2019; the comprehensive reference publication explores the figure of Maya Ruiz-Picasso, Pablo Picasso’s beloved eldest daughter, throughout Picasso’s work and chronicles the loving relationship between the artist and his daughter. In this video, Widmaier-Ruiz-Picasso details her ongoing interest in the subject and reflects on the process of making the book.

The Films of Man Ray: Mysterious Encounters of Realities and Dreams

The Films of Man Ray: Mysterious Encounters of Realities and Dreams

Timothy Baum muses on Man Ray’s foray into filmmaking in the 1920s, the subject of the exhibition Man Ray: The Mysteries of Château du Dé at Gagosian, San Francisco. 

Gagosian Quarterly Winter 2019

Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Winter 2019

The Winter 2019 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring a selection from Christopher Wool’s Westtexaspsychosculpture series on its cover.

Gagosian Quarterly Fall 2019

Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Fall 2019

The Fall 2019 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring a detail from Sinking (2019) by Nathaniel Mary Quinn on its cover.

Nature and Inspiration: Henry Moore at Houghton Hall

Nature and Inspiration: Henry Moore at Houghton Hall

Sebastiano Barassi reflects on the centrality of nature in the work of Henry Moore—as form, material, inspiration, and site.

Visions of the Self: Jenny Saville on Rembrandt

Visions of the Self: Jenny Saville on Rembrandt

Jenny Saville reveals the process behind her new self-portrait, painted in response to Rembrandt’s masterpiece Self-Portrait with Two Circles.

Claude Picasso and John Richardson

In Conversation
Claude Picasso and John Richardson

Picasso biographer Sir John Richardson sits down with Claude Picasso to discuss Claude’s photography, his enjoyment of vintage car racing, and the future of scholarship related to his father, Pablo Picasso.

Man Ray: Visual Poet and Wit

Man Ray: Visual Poet and Wit

At the 2018 Frieze Masters fair in London, Gagosian’s stand presented more than ninety works by Man Ray: objects and assemblages, collages, oils, prints, drawings, and photographs. Richard Calvocoressi traces the development of the artist’s wide-ranging work and looks at his legendary three-year collaboration with Lee Miller.

Exiles in Paradise

Gagosian Quarterly Talks
Exiles in Paradise

Lawrence Weschler profiles the European exiles in Los Angeles during the 1930s and ’40s, examining how cultural visionaries, from Man Ray to Arnold Schoenberg, navigated the dramatic change in setting.