Cecil Beaton: The Royal Portraits

Review by Beatta M Tuominen ·

The textured soft pink cover of Cecil Beaton: The Royal Portraits is as inviting as is the image of Princess Elizabeth with Prince Charles at Clarence House printed on it. Holding the heavy book and feeling the cover gives the reader a glimpse of the intimate nature of the portraits that the late Cecil Beaton (1904 – 1980) captured along with official portraits for over fifty years, shaping the public image of the royal family.

Hugo Vickers’ foreword is a delightful insight into Beaton’s character and how he was perceived by his royal models. Throughout the book the reader also gets to read several of Beaton’s diary entries, giving in turn an insight into those that sat for him. He was a great admirer of the Queen Mother, and Beaton felt that he knew some of his subject as well as he did his close friends.

Arranged in chronological order from 1930 to 1979 the images, along with the narrative, open a window into the lives of those depicted on the pages. The captions for each image make the book feel like watching a documentary of the royal family. Before Beaton’s work the monarchy had felt inaccessible and private. In 1968, the same year Beaton photographed the Queen for the last time, the National Portrait Gallery had announced a groundbreaking exhibition of Beaton’s work, as it was the first time photographs were exhibited at the Portrait Gallery, as well as a portrait of a living monarch.

The reader can also see Beaton’s development as a photographer from his elaborate backdrops influenced by his theater background and paintings for set design, eventually moving to simpler backdrops. He did love to photograph the palace as well, and that remained one of the main settings for his portraits, creating a grandeur for the official portraits with the royal costumes and crown jewels worn by the Queen Mother.

Acott Williams made the right decision to include some of Beaton’s contact sheets, diary entries and working proofs, allowing the reader to get an idea of how the fashion photographer worked and chose to compose as well as crop his final images, and what edits he made to achieve his iconic portraits.

Cecil Beaton had published several books during his lifetime, including Royal Portraits in 1963, and Roy Strong also published his curated volume Cecil Beaton: Royal Portraits in 1988, but in this volume published 2023 we get several new images not published in those previous collections. The Library of St. John’s College at Cambridge holds a collection of 145 volumes of Beaton’s diaries and personal correspondence for those interested in diving deeper into Cecil Beaton’s life and work.

Claudia Acott Williams’ historical text and well curated collection of images in Cecil Beaton: The Royal Portraits makes this book not only suitable for portrait photographers’ libraries, but also a staple for any British Royal Family enthusiast’s coffee table.

____

Beatta M Tuominen is a Finnish-born, Southern California-based visual artist who explores the nuances of our many connections.

____

Cecil Beaton: The Royal Portraits, Claudia Acott Williams

Photographer: Cecil Beaton (Fashion photographer, author, stage designer, born in Hamstead, London, 1904 – 1980)

Text: Claudia Acott Williams, Foreword: Hugo Vickers

Language: English

Hardbound, with illustrated cover, 240 pages; 10 x 11.9 inches; 224 illustrations, 74 in color; Select Bibliography; Chronological List of Sittings; Picture Credits and Index; printed and bound in China by C&C Offset Printing Co. Ltd; ISBN 978-0-500-48092-2

Book Design: Myfanwy Vernon-Hunt

_____

___

____

____

____

____

____

____

____

____

____

Articles and photographs published in the PhotoBook Journal may not be reproduced without the permission of the PhotoBook Journal staff and the photographer(s). All images, texts, and designs are under copyright by the authors and publishers.