Frances McLaughlin-Gill
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Frances McLaughlin-Gill (1919–2014) was an American photographer and the first female
fashion photographer Fashion photography is a genre of photography that portrays clothing and other fashion items. This sometimes includes haute couture garments. It typically consists of a fashion photographer taking pictures of a dressed model in a photographic stu ...
under contract with ''
Vogue Vogue may refer to: Business * ''Vogue'' (magazine), a US fashion magazine ** British ''Vogue'', a British fashion magazine ** '' Vogue Adria'', a fashion magazine for former Yugoslav countries ** ''Vogue Arabia'', an Arab fashion magazine ** ' ...
''. After two decades in the fashion industry, she worked as an independent film producer for a decade making commercials and films. One of her films won the Gold Medal at the 1969 International Films and TV Festival of New York. In her later career, she published several collections both with her sister and in collaboration with other authors.


Early life

Frances McLaughlin was born on September 22, 1919, in
Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...
to Kathryn and Frank McLaughlin. She was the twin sister of Kathryn Abbe. Her father died when the twins were three months old and the family relocated to
Wallingford, Connecticut Wallingford is a town in New Haven County, Connecticut, New Haven County, Connecticut, United States, centrally located between New Haven, Connecticut, New Haven and Hartford, Connecticut, Hartford, and Boston and New York City. The town is part ...
, where they completed their schooling. Frances graduated from
Lyman Hall High School Lyman Hall High School is a public high school located at 70 Pond Hill Road in Wallingford, Connecticut. It is part of the Wallingford Public School System, and one of two public high schools in Wallingford, Mark T. Sheehan being the other. Hist ...
as the class valedictorian and Kathryn was salutatorian in 1937. The twins then enrolled in
Pratt Institute Pratt Institute is a private university with its main campus in Brooklyn, New York. It has an additional campus in Manhattan and an extension campus in Utica, New York at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute. The institute was founded in 18 ...
to study photography, graduating in 1941. That same year, both entered the ''Prix de Paris'' contest sponsored by ''
Vogue Vogue may refer to: Business * ''Vogue'' (magazine), a US fashion magazine ** British ''Vogue'', a British fashion magazine ** '' Vogue Adria'', a fashion magazine for former Yugoslav countries ** ''Vogue Arabia'', an Arab fashion magazine ** ' ...
'' and were among the five finalists.


Career

McLaughlin began working as a stylist at
Montgomery Ward Montgomery Ward is the name of two successive U.S. retail corporations. The original Montgomery Ward & Co. was a mail-order business and later a department store chain that operated between 1872 and 2001; its common nickname was "Monkey Wards". ...
and as a photography assistant until 1943. That year, photographer
Toni Frissell Antoinette Frissell Bacon (March 10, 1907 – April 17, 1988), known professionally as Toni Frissell, was an American photographer. She was known for her innovations in fashion photography, World War II photographs, and portraits of famous Ameri ...
introduced her to
Alexander Liberman Alexander Semeonovitch Liberman (September 4, 1912 – November 19, 1999) was a Ukrainian-American magazine editor, publisher, painter, photographer, and sculptor. He held senior artistic positions during his 32 years at Condé Nast Publicatio ...
, ''Vogue''′s art director, who signed McLaughlin under contract, becoming their first contracted female fashion photographer. Liberman thought McLaughlin had a fresh approach. To him, her directness and spontaneity made McLaughlin an ideal photographer, because her images were less posed and more natural than many fashion photographers working at that time. She began on shoots with junior models working for ''Vogue''′s ''
Glamour Magazine ''Glamour'' is a multinational online women's magazine published by Condé Nast Publications and based in New York City. It was originally called ''Glamour of Hollywood''. From 1939 to 2019, Glamour was a print magazine. Due to decreasing numb ...
'' which was aimed at younger viewers and was able to capture movement in ways that had not been done before. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, McLaughlin produced some of the strongest images that appeared in the American edition of ''Vogue''. In addition to fashion photographs, her images included celebrity photos, as well as
still lifes A still life (: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or human-made (drinking glasses, books, ...
for editorials and covers of '' House & Garden''. In 1948, she married the photographer
Leslie Gill Leslie may refer to: * Leslie (name), a name and list of people with the given name or surname, including fictional characters Families * Clan Leslie, a Scottish clan with the motto "grip fast" * Leslie (Russian nobility), a Russian noble family ...
, who was known as one of the first photographers to use color film. One of the high points of her career, was McLaughlin's work at the 1952
Paris Fashion Week Paris Fashion Week (, commonly ) is a series of designer presentations held semi-annually in Paris, France, with spring/summer and autumn/winter events held each year. Dates are determined by the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode. Pa ...
. In 1954, though she continued working for ''Glamour'', ''House & Garden'' and ''Vogue'', McLaughlin became a freelance photographer with
Condé Nast Publications Condé is a French place name and personal name. It is ultimately derived from a Celtic word, "Condate", meaning "confluence" (of two rivers) - from which was derived the Romanised form "Condatum", in use during the Roman period, and thence to ...
. She was a regular contributor to British ''Vogue'' throughout
the Sixties File:1960s montage.png, Clockwise from top left: U.S. soldiers during the Vietnam War; the Beatles led the British Invasion of the U.S. music market; a half-a-million people participate in the 1969 Woodstock Festival; Neil Armstrong and Buz ...
. Gill died suddenly in 1958, and it was after his death, that McLaughlin began hyphenating her surname. The following year, the sisters worked together on a collection of children's photographs that were featured in ''Modern Photography''. Between 1964 and 1973, McLaughlin-Gill made television commercials and films as an independent film producer and director. Her film ''Cover Girl: New Face in Focus'', about Model of the Year, Elaine Fulkerson’s journey to become a fashion model, won the Gold Medal at the 1969 International Films and TV Festival of New York. Then in the late 1970s, she began teaching photography seminars at Manhattan's
School of Visual Arts The School of Visual Arts New York City (SVA NYC) is a private for-profit art school in New York City. It was founded in 1947 and is a member of the Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design. History This school was started by Silas ...
. McLaughlin-Gill began publishing some of her later works in book form after 1976. Some of her best known collections were ''Women Photograph Men'' published in 1976 and ''Twins on Twins'' which was published in 1981 with her twin sister, Kathryn Abbe. She also made photographs for several author's books, including a book about body language, ''Face Talk, Hand Talk, Body Talk'' (1977) by Sue Castle and Jane Fearer Safer's ''Spirals From the Sea: An Anthropological Look at Shells'' (1983). In 1984, she prepared photographs for a retrospective exhibit of her husband's works for the
New Orleans Museum of Art The New Orleans Museum of Art (or NOMA) is the oldest art museum, fine arts museum in the city of New Orleans, Louisiana, New Orleans. It is situated within City Park (New Orleans), City Park, a short distance from the intersection of Carrollton ...
. In 1995, an exhibit of her photographs was held at Hamilton's Gallery in London and in 2011, she and her sister published their final book together, ''Twin Lives in Photography''. The sisters were the subject of a 2009 documentary,''Twin Lenses'' produced by
Nina Rosenblum Nina Rosenblum (born September 20, 1950) is an American documentary film and television producer and director and member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Directors Guild of America. Italian Fotoleggendo magazine said Rose ...
, which highlighted their pioneering roles in photography and included interviews with the twins. McLaughlin-Gill died on October 23, 2014.


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Further reading

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:McLaughlin-Gill, Frances 1919 births 2014 deaths People from Wallingford, Connecticut Photographers from New York City American twins Pratt Institute alumni Vogue (magazine) people