BRIAN STONEHOUSE (1918-1998)
Portrait of woman. Graphite on paper. 460x197 mm; 18x7¾ inches, roughly, as paper edges unevenly trimmed. Signed and dated "Brian Stonehouse-N.Y.C. 1956" in lower right image. Tipped to matte and framed. Stonehouse was a fascinating figure. He served as a World War II spy and went on to become one of the most prominent fashion illustrators throughout the 1950s-60s.British born but raised in France, his artistic and translation skills earned him the position of Special Operations Executive during the war. He was captured and sent to prison in Germany where, for a time, an SS guard who was sympathetic and appreciated his skills, assigned him to create portraits of officers and their families. He barely survived further imprisonment and concentration camps and formed the International Prisoners Committee with fellow British officers, assisting war victims and raising morale until Liberation Day in 1945. After the war, he resumed his artistic ambitions, emigrating to New York and becoming the first fashion illustrator hired by Vogue since 1939. For the next three decades, his work for Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and print advertising focused on women's fashion, until the liberal air of the 70's allowed him the freedom of expression to begin creating homoerotic imagery and fine art. Only a small body of his original artwork survives, though a small but excellent show of his drawings was on display at the Henry Miller Fine Arts exhibition at Coningsby Gallery in England last year.