Vivien Leigh

1 portrait

Angus McBean Photograph. © Harvard Theatre Collection, Harvard University.

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Vivien Leigh

by Angus McBean
vintage bromide print, 1952
19 7/8 in. x 15 3/4 in. (505 mm x 400 mm)
Purchased, 1977
Primary Collection
NPG P62

Sitterback to top

  • Vivien Leigh (1913-1967), Actress. Sitter associated with 147 portraits.

Artistback to top

  • Angus McBean (1904-1990), Photographer. Artist or producer associated with 283 portraits, Sitter in 79 portraits.

This portraitback to top

McBean was introduced to Vivien Leigh by Ivor Novello and first photographed her in 1937 as part of her campaign to secure the role of Scarlett O'Hara in the film, Gone with the Wind. He went on to photograph her many times over the next thirty years. This double-exposure portrait was taken in the year she played Blanche du Bois in A Streetcar Named Desire, a role for which she won her second Oscar.

Linked publicationsback to top

  • Pepper, Terence, Angus McBean Portraits, 2006 (accompanying the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from 5 July to 22 October 2006), p. 85 Read entry

    This double-exposure portrait is generally acknowledged as being McBean’s most iconic portrait of Leigh from the 1950s. McBean chose it to appear on the cover of his book on Leigh, Vivien: A Love Affair In Camera. He was somewhat perturbed by Laurence Olivier's comment that the portrait was clever in that it showed the two faces of Leigh, one of poise and glamour and the other reflecting her dark side.

Linked displays and exhibitionsback to top

Events of 1952back to top

Current affairs

King George VI is found dead in his bed in Sandringham; he had been suffering from lung cancer. His daughter Elizabeth, who was in Kenya at the time, became Queen, the only monarch not to know the precise moment of her accession as her father was alone when he died. Elizabeth was crowned the following year.

Art and science

Samuel Beckett's play, Waiting for Godot is performed for the first time in Paris. The play belongs to the Theatre of the Absurd style, which influenced playwrights such as Harold Pinter and Tom Stoppard.
Agatha Christie's play The Mousetrap opens in London. It is still going.

International

Mau Mau rebels in Kenya rise up against the British colonial administration. The rebellion was sparked by the growing poverty of the native farmers under the rule of white settlers and called for Kenyan independence. The violence of the rebels, who often murdered settlers and loyalists, was met by the indiscriminate suppression by the British Military, who executed hundreds of suspects.

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