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'A Life in Pictures: The Douglas Kirkland Monograph' — a collection of iconic images

Douglas Kirkland is so much more than the iconic images of celebrities that have made him famous. He has amassed an impressive body of work throughout his 60-year photography career, his images running the gamut from stars and filmmakers to classics and collectibles to love and nudes. In"A Life in Pictures: The Douglas Kirkland Monograph," the photographer presents a collection of his images accompanied by the story of his career’s development told from his perspective, through a 40,000-word autobiographical text, an almost unheard-of accompaniment to a photography monograph.

As a young Canadian artist, Kirkland took his first photo on a frosty Christmas morning in front of his family’s house in Fort Erie, Ontario. With his love for photography sparked and sealed in that moment, he eventually worked for such publications as Look and Life magazines. Kirkland’s career took off with his legendary 1961 Marilyn Monroe shoot for Look's 25th-anniversary issue, the photographs from which are still re-created by stars today. With a foreword by acclaimed director Baz Luhrmann and his wife, Catherine Martin, this written and visual memoir is, finally, a comprehensive collection of images honoring the important photographer, who has assiduously recorded and shaped contemporary culture through his exceptional eye and incomparable lens.

Douglas Kirkland was born in Toronto, Canada. He joined Look magazine in his early 20s and went on to work for Life during the golden age of photojournalism in the '60s and '70s. His assignments included photo essays on Greece, Japan and Lebanon, as well as fashion and celebrity work with such stars as Marlene Dietrich, Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor.

Through the years, Kirkland has worked on the sets of more than 100 films, including “Australia” (2008), “Moulin Rouge!” (2001), “Titanic” (1997), “Out of Africa” (1985), “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” (1969) and “2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968). His many book credits include the best-selling “James Cameron's ‘Titanic,’” for which he took the photographs (HarperCollins, 1997), and his book “Freeze Frame: 5 Decades/400 Photographs” (Glitterati, 2007), a decade-by-decade look at a half-century spent behind the scenes in the entertainment industry. Kirkland’s other Glitterati titles include “Coco Chanel: Three Weeks/1962,” “Michael Jackson: The Making of ‘Thriller’” and “With Marilyn: An Evening/1961.”

Kirkland's fine-art photography has been exhibited all over the world and is included in the permanent collections of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (Beverly Hills, Calif.), the Annenberg Space for Photography (Los Angeles, Calif.), the George Eastman House (Rochester, N.Y.), the Houston Center for Photography, the Smithsonian Institution (Washington, D.C.), the National Portrait Gallery (Canberra, Australia) and the National Portrait Gallery (London).

(Photography by Douglas Kirkland)

The book is available at glitteratiincorporated.com.
A Life in Pictures: An Evening with Douglas Kirkland — April 14, 2015, 7-8.30 p.m., at the School of Visual Arts in New York, hosted by MPS Digital Photography and Canon USA.

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