More than Meets the Eye

By Kate Richards

Spotlight

A woman in a beautiful gown with perfect hair and glowing skin walks the red carpet, posing for photos that will forever capture not only her beauty,

but, to a critical eye decades later, the notion of female movie stars as captives of a commodified sense of glamour in Western culture.

The Ryerson Image Centre is host-ing two multimedia exhibitions after

Curator Gaëlle Morel highlights moods of photographers, commodification of movie stars in Ryerson glamour exhibition

the new year that explore the idea of glamour in the entertainment industry.

Burn with Desire: Photography and Glamour uses prints from the RIC’s Black Star Collection and other sources to showcase more than 120 photos of Hollywood film stars from all eras.

The collection includes classic glam-our portraits and red-carpet photos of icons such as Marilyn Monroe, Gina Lollabrigida, Mamie Van Doren, So-phia Loren and Gloria Swanson. But many of the photos present a less tradi-tional side of glamour, with set photos and images of the stars at rest, or what Gaëlle Morel, the exhibit’s curator, de-scribes as “stolen moments.”

The images selected for this portion of the exhibit present an “idea of how movie stars are treated as commodi-ties and objects of seduction and how those images were produced and dis-seminated to sell a very specific mes-sage of sexualization,” says Morel.

But more than this, they convey the photographic process. “It’s not that the photos convey the wrong message. It’s not about that,” said Morel.

Morel pointed out a series of 13 pho-

tos of Marilyn Monroe at the Golden Globes’ red carpet from 1962, saying, “You can see how the photographer is falling in love with her … He’s spin-ning around her.

“It’s really about the profession and how professional photographers used to work but at the same time it’s an in-credible series of a woman who’s been consciously objectified.”

The exhibit will also feature many contemporary artistic works that ad-dress the traditional idea of glamour “and the stereotypes and cliches that the photographs convey,” said Morel. Art projects by Richard Avedon, Cindy Sherman and Andy Warhol will all be on display.

A second exhibit will run alongside Burn with Desire. Anti Glamour: Portraits of Women will feature photo and video pieces by artists who address issues surrounding female representation and will compliment Burn with Desire.

Burn with Desire: Photography and Glamour runs at the Ryerson Image Cen-tre, 33 Gould Street Toronto, Jan. 21 to April 5, free admission, free tours daily at 2:30 p.m., ryerson.ca/ric

Photographer unknown, Untitled [Gina Lollobrigida at the inauguration of the Venice Film Festival], August 1956, BS.2005.288961/194- 130. Black Star Collections, Ryerson Image Centre

Photographer unknown, Untitled [Sophia Loren], 1953, gelatin silver print,

BS.2005.288948/194- 196. Black Star Collec-tions, Ryerson Image Centre

Gene Daniels, Untitled [Marilyn Monroe at the Golden Globes cer-emony], March 1962, gelatin silver print, BS.2005.190094/113- 1201. Black Star Collections, Ryerson Image Centre

Photographer unknown, Untitled [Mamie Van Doren], date and location unknown, gelatin silver print, BS.2005.216415/129- 757. Black Star Collections, Ryerson Image Centre