Francesco Scavullo

Introduction

The artwork radically departs from the editorial conventions of its era to embrace a profoundly avant-garde aesthetic, in which the subject is transfigured into a literal living sculpture. The model, Naomi Sims, universally recognized as the first internationally successful African-American supermodel, is not depicted here to showcase a garment or to uphold a reassuring ideal of beauty; instead, she is elevated to a surreal, almost divine, and intangible icon.