Bettina exhibition at Galerie Azzedine Alaïa
When talking about top models, we immediately think of the 90 models with Claudia Schiffer, Carla Bruni, Linda Evengelista ect … .. but it should not be forgotten before there were few supermodels who carved their names into history. If this is an essential one, it’s Bettina Francese.
This exhibition dedicated to her, retrieves the clichés that made her famous, and a return to the great years of fashion with the birth of the current luxury homes and discover the unusual career of a young girl from the country became one of the first French cover girls and unforgettable figure in the world of fashion.
Scholler Guy recounts his career:
« Bettina spent the first years of her life in Rouen, in the region of Elbeuf in Upper Normandy. His father had left the family home when she was six months old, she was raised with his sister Catherine, her eldest of three years, by their mother, a teacher of kindergarten in the region. With this woman loving and warm, Bettina had a happy childhood.
The war occurs, and the exodus: she left with her sister lives Angers where their grandmother, who was killed during a bombardment. We must flee again. They then leave for Agen then return in Elbeuf, until the Liberation, four years later. These difficult years, where she almost died several times, Bettina unscathed, perhaps even stronger, aware that fear him is estrangère.
Her character is revealed, affirmed and demonstrated exceptional balance. Her faith in the existence, vitality are assets that will support an extraordinary journey. However Bettina love life too much to be concerned about the fate.
Like all girls on her age, Bettina dream. But already, she is among those who live their ideals. One day in the cinema, seeing Janine Charrat dance The Dying Swan, she decided to become a dancer. It manufactures slippers with padded sneakers and began to work the dance with a friend just as passionate, but also lacks experience it. After a few months, they manage to make appearance on stage at a party patronage. Bettina was then spotted by an American dancer, who offers her his first real ballet shoes. It was she who taught him the job to the bar and tap dancing. Bettina says already unrivaled head carriage and a sense of instinctive pose.
At 18, she decided to live in Paris. She always wanted since his sister Catherine lives there. Every time Catherine returns, she is dressed like a Parisian, and her little sister loves these outfits, which are for her the height of chic. She tries dresses, shoes and silk stockings with obvious happiness. Holding that there is no future for her in Elbeuf, it was with more expectations than resources it embarks on the adventure she moved to the capital, decided to become a fashion designer .
She moved first avenue de Villiers, a couple whose home she keeps children. She quickly gets appointment with Jacques Costet, a young designer who has just opened its showroom at 4, rue de la Paix. This event will change the course of her life.
The young designer who receives dressed way « zazoue elegance » is actually less interested in his drawings by itself. He finally asked her to spend a lavish dress. His fate is played back from the cabin, where the waiting, meeting in the large living room, all the staff of the house. She dazzles everyone with its natural and allure. « Come this afternoon. You start as a fashion model! ‘Says Costet. The second Bettina life begins. It will be twelve years of an extraordinary career and a dazzling success.
The afternoon of June 1, it does not run. She watches models, febrile haste with which they change, how fast they are styling, to wrap carefully in scarves, seize bags, umbrellas and other accessories.
But already the next day, she spent her first collection. The public is stunned, delighted with her lack of experience, its « refreshing. » Her good looks, her round cheeks, her freckles, her innate grace, everything about her seduces clients.
It can then leave the Avenue de Villiers and child custody to live with Toni, also model at Costet, in a tiny apartment rue Raynouard. This will be a brief interlude towards independence, before finding a place of her own. The beginning salary is not huge and allows him no madness. Only a sandwich lunch and dine with a cup of coffee with milk, it retains a perfect line without difficulty. She does not know many people and can not for lack of money, go Elbeuf. A far cry from the high life: neither cinema nor theater, few restaurants. But his faith in the future is indestructible.
His first pictures back to the Costet period. The Seeberger brothers are already interested in her and introduce the world of the image.
A year later she met Benno Graziani; to follow, she will forget her profession and leave a year living in Juan-les-Pins. In December 1946, back in Paris, where they marry. The dummy grass back to work. An appointment is taken Lucien Lelong. In going to present in the office of the couturier, she meets a young man with a little round physique, who timidly addresses: « If Mr. Lelong does not take you, I urge you because I will open my home sewing. « It was Christian Dior! It is only little time at Lelong because it annoys them. His choice then is about Jacques Fath. When present in his fashion house, Fath greets with his usual kindness and instantly engages.
It’s Fath will baptize Bettina. Their meeting is the beginning of a metamorphosis. It is a joyous time when everything succeeds him, where life changes once again. Her salary also has changed: it has increased fivefold.
The Fath house, beautifully located in a luxurious mansion on the Avenue Pierre 1er-de-Serbia experiencing a wonderfully warm atmosphere. The cabin of the models is one of the prettiest in Paris: Louise, Doudou, Tulip, Renée become friends, then this is the arrival of Sophie – later married the director Anantol Litvak – that will become her best friend.
In those years, the models were part of a mandatory fashion house. They entaient attached to a designer they represented exclusively, marching only for him. The meeting with Bettina Fath is the beginning of a new style. In his first presentation collection Jacques Fath will create for her thirty dresses. The new-look hardly inspires the designer who realizes dresses with simple lines that only knows Bettina wear with many chic as natural. For her, Fath creates a real style for women closer to those encountered in the street. With sixty-six meter, it is not like the other models, the biggest for most. Bettina style is different. Made of natural and freshness, pace and gaiety, Bettina has elegance while thwarting the sophistication that freezes and stiffens the images of the models of his time.
She became the muse of Fath. Often it suggests him ideas and he considers. Everywhere Fath Bettina this as its top model – the horrible term supermodel fortunately not yet exist. The public is seduced, the name of Bettina becomes that of modernity and elegance.
Her career began in the photo. Is required by all the fashion magazines. John Knight, one of the great photographers of the moment, is also artistic director of the newspaper it, that created and directs Hélène Lazareff. It presents Bettina. She gives him his first cover. The agreement of these three is such that it will sign the most beautiful pages of the magazine at that time. Hélène Lazareff is then « the » key figure in fashion. His influence is such that it makes and breaks glories. She is enthusiastic about Bettina, so much so that the young model becomes familiar sacrosanct Sunday lunch that give Pierre and Helene Lazareff in their home in Louveciennes, near Paris, and brings together all that matters celebrities of the moment . A kind of consecration for Bettina, who will know where the best talent in politics, the arts, literature and of course fashion.
Naturally gifted, Bettina is a few months the first cover girl of France. Vogue also is infatuated with her and spends her blankets. She soon sought by all that matters in the fashion press.
Gradually, she learns to use her face and use the secrets of makeup. To hide her freckles, it covers a very white foundation, she digs her cheeks with black shade under the cheekbones. As for her eyes, it borders the elegant black line with that enlarges the mind. Irving Penn, she learns to color its black mouth to better draw for the contrasts of black and white. She spends hours trying everything, to transform, to create a sophisticated image. But becoming supermodel divine suppose to stay in the most uncomfortable positions.
And there, Bettina is unbeatable! Courage, good humor and love of work will participate in the phenomenon « Bettina ».
Fath will put the finishing touches to its new image by sending in Georgel, the most famous hairdressers of the time, and asking the master himself cut her beautiful red hair. He brought the idea of America. Bettina spring from the hands of almost mowed Georgel: Hair to a centimeter. Paris-Match made an immediate report on « the French the most photographed of France, » and she immediately imitated by hundreds of admirers. Bettina is launching a new fashion and Fath created for the occasion her famous series of blouses closed with a rose. Despite his dizzying success, she will long loyal to Fatah.
It works great for photo shoots. All the greatest photographers of the world compete: Irving Penn, Dick Dormen, Norman Parkinson, Erwin Blumenfeld, Henry Clarke, Gordon Parks, Jean-Philippe Charbonnier … until Henri Cartier-Bresson normally rejects any idea pictures mode. Yet, seduced by the personality of Bettina, he will photograph the natural, beautiful images successfully. At 22, she became the most famous landforms.
Invited to the USA by Vogue at the request of the great American photographer Irving Penn, who she has been a year earlier in Paris, between the famous Bettina and any new agency Eileen Ford in 1950. In New York, the modeling life so much resembles to that conducted in Paris where good humor is a must. In America, no improvisation! Rigor and discipline! Everything is counted, timed. In Paris, modeling agencies do not yet exist.
Back in Paris she left Benno and she moved to the Hotel Montaigne, near the Bar des Theatres. The place is alive, gay, it is the center of artistic life in Paris. It is close to home Fath, friend, counselor, confidant.
Bettina is free and adored. Her new love, a young 35 year old editor, he discovered a new Paris where she met editors and writers: Gaston Gallimard became for her a true friend, and Louis Guilloux, Faulkner, Kessel, Simenon, Genet and Prévert, who will write on her a poem for a report that L’Album du Figaro entrust white card Bettina as editor.
She travels a lot for work: the United States, Brazil, Argentina … and for his pleasure with his publisher friend who introduced him to Italy: Capri, where she meets Malaparte and Naples, Rome and Florence. He guided his reading and music. She enjoys this life.
In 1952, she joined Hubert de Givenchy and help to launch his fashion house. Work with Givenchy’s Bettina true happiness because it is involved in everything. Scrolls but also handles public relations. It launched many creations of famous fashion designer. Everyone remembers the Bettina blouse, name we gave to this wonderful model for strength to see pictured on the famous model in all the magazines and all the photographers. But witness the birth of a fashion house requires sacrifice and Bettina renounce even a time in her photos to devote himself entirely to the couturier whose success is growing. She accompanies him everywhere. When he takes her to New York, where she presented her designs as a model, but also works as a press officer in the famous Charity Ball April in Paris, held at the Waldorf Astoria, director Edward R. Murrow asked her to work in television and film producer offered her a contract in Hollywood.
This is an opportunity for her to discover a new world, the world of cinema, actors, directors and producers. She meets Greta Garbo, Elizabeth Taylor, Gregory Peck, Bogart, Ava Gardner, John Huston, Irving Shaw, Charlie Chaplin … It leads during her stay in Hollywood, a very American life, though are still nostalgic for Paris .
The year 1955 will mark the peak of his career. Pictures of Bettina are in the press around the world and it does not stop working. The exposure rate Bettina then peaked seven thousand francs an hour! Unheard of at the time. Constant demand, Bettina is all events: here is a rose named Bettina, where she was chosen to be the godmother of the first computer purchased by the French headquarters of the Shell …
It was at that time that Bettina will meet the love of his life and for him, she will leave the mode, deciding to abandon the fashion houses and stopping to pose for magazines overnight.
Despite her premature departure of the great fashion scene and the net off its dramatic trajectory modeling, Bettina has always been present in the world of fashion. As proof, these pictures of her where we often do not distinguish the private snapshot of the magazine picture and these « returns » common in this world that can not forget: in 1969, Coco Chanel asked to pose for an entire collection that will inspire and present, then it’s Emanuel Ungaro who called to care for his couture … magazines, intrigued by this extremely well known figure, which now does s ‘exposes more, continue to be interested in it regularly. Bettina loves fashion; she plays, she uses it follows or precedes always it bathes in with relish. Instinctively recognizing the talent of the designers before anyone else, that which carries both Balenciaga, Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent’s early set his sights on Azzedine Alaïa, one of the few undisputed talents of our time, who ‘dresses for several years. The passage of time has done nothing to lose under acute it relates to the world of fashion forward, kindness and curiosity.
Bettina Bettina will always be. »
Bettina exhibition, free and open entry every day from 11h to 19h, from 13 November 2014 to 11 January 2015 at the Galerie Azzedine Alaïa 18, rue de la Verrerie. Paris 4
By Frédéric Blanc Fashion -Spider
