Terry O’Neill at NEST

Photography by Nathan Valentine on April 11th, 2013 in Arts, Culture, Miami Design District

Terry O’Neill

Miami, FL – April 11, 2013 – He’s photographed everyone from The Beatles to Fred Astaire. Legendary British photographer Terry O’Neill came to Miami last week to present his exhibition of iconic photographs at the Design District’s upscale home design store, NEST. The collection of 35 photographs is called “It Girls & Boys” because they’re portraits of the “it” people of the time. Curated by The Little Black Gallery of London exclusively for NEST, “It Girls & Boys” has photographs of icons like Audrey Hepburn, Brigitte Bardot, Frank Sinatra, and many others on display and available for purchase from now until June 2013. To have one of these photographs would not only make for a great art piece in the home, but it’s also a timeless collector’s item of iconic style, fashion, and people from over the span of O’Neill’s remarkable 50 year career. Tons of Miami’s art, design, and fashion enthusiasts came to the special exhibit launch to meet O’Neill and see the art, including Latin American TV star Candela Ferro. With such a prominent name in the photography world coming to Miami, World Red Eye had to have a few words with him. We caught up with O’Neill who talked about some of his fondest memories from over the years, telling us the priceless stories that go with these stunning photos.

Terry O’Neill: I’m really pleased with the [above] photograph because it was my idea. What happened was, I was shooting [Faye Dunaway] for People magazine, and the week before they always shot who they thought was going to win [The Oscars]. So I told her ‘if you win, I have this picture to do’ because everyone who wins an Oscar always has a shot after of them smiling and all that. I’d been with Oscar winners and realized that the morning after- that’s what the picture’s called, ‘The Morning After’- is when the penny drops. Her money would automatically jump, and suddenly she’ll get every offer of every filmmaker. So I wanted to capture that moment, and I said we need to do it at 6:30 in the morning. They wouldn’t let us do it at the hotel, but the guy who ran the pool was my friend so he let us in, and she did the picture which was great. She went to bed about half past three. It’s become a famous Hollywood picture now, and no one has had the savvy to try to redo it. That’s what I’m proud of. You can’t get close to stars like that anymore.

Sara Colombo

TON: Audrey Hepburn? Oh you couldn’t miss with her. She was the most stunning, lovely, beautiful girl ever. It was an honor to be with her. She was just a fab, fab, person. I don’t know whether she was always happy in life, but she was a great person to work with.

TON: It all started as accidental, really. I was a jazz drummer and found out British Airways started flying to America. At the time, the only way to get to America was by taking a boat for six weeks, and this plane flew for 14 hours. So I went to British Airways, and there was a job for a 17 year old, I was 20, and I took this job in the photographic unit. They’d send me on homework assignments to the airport on Saturday mornings to photograph people saying goodbye, hugging, and all that reporter stuff. I accidentally took a picture of a guy in a pinstripe suit sitting among some African chiefs, and he had fallen asleep. It turned out to be the English Foreign Minister. A reporter saw it and asked me if he could have the film to send to his picture editor. So I rang the guy at five o’clock and he said he really liked my photographs and asked if I’d cover the airport for him every Saturday. I said I don’t really know what I’m doing. He said ‘no matter, just keep taking pictures like you’re doing- they’re great.’ So I did that, and then I met another guy who was a Fleet Street hot shot. He died in a plane crash, so I got offered his job. I told the picture editor then that I didn’t know what I was doing because I wasn’t really interested in it, I wanted to be a jazz drummer, and then he said ‘no no no, you’re perfect. You’re going to be the youngest photographer on Fleet Street. You’ll be 12 years younger than anybody else. We want to get into pop music- we think it’s going to be really big.’ So he sent me to photograph this new group. I go down to Abbey Road, and I photograph the group, and it turns out to be The Beatles. The pictures took three months to publish, which is unusual in the newspapers, but they wanted to wait until the record came out. That was the first picture of a pop group in newspapers, so suddenly I’m up and flying.

TON: As I went on, I became more and more well-known. And once you have a reputation, you photograph someone, and they respect you, you respect them. I mean all the top stars I’ve worked with, I’d never double cross them or do what paparazzi do. If someone’s kind enough to let you into their lives, you owe them the respect to behave yourself and act accordingly. You don’t show someone picking their nose or whatever. It’s just awful. And I’ve respected all the artists I’ve worked with, I’ve never had any trouble with any of them really. They just let me into their lives. I used to spend two weeks with them, and we became friends. I mean I cannot complain, I’ve had the greatest life anyone can ask for.

Sara Colombo & Terry O’Neill

TON: One of the first jobs I had was to photograph Frank Sinatra here in Miami at the Fontainebleau. He was singing at the Fontainebleau at night and filming during the day. It was fab. How I got that was because I became friends with Eva Gardner in London, and I said ‘I’ve got a chance to photograph your ex husband.’ So she wrote a letter for me- I always wanted to know what it said- and I handed it to him and said ‘this is from Ms. Gardner.’ He reads it, says ‘right. you’re with me.’ Then totally ignored me for the next three weeks, but in doing that I realized after I finished that he gave me the greatest gift of anyone. I followed him around, and he let me go everywhere with him. It also made me realize he was probably still in love with Eva Gardner, which he was. She came to Miami, and he was married to Mia Farrow when he did this film, so he had her staying at one hotel, and Eva came in from London. He sent ten security guys to meet her at the airport, somehow they missed her, they all get back to the hotel, and they find her with Joey Brown- a famous American comedian at the time- both pissed out of their heads, and she left the next day. I mean they had the worst relationship because they were madly in love but it just didn’t work. It was sad really, because they were a great couple but anyway, what can you do?

Tamara Beckwith & Fawaz Gruoisi

Sara Colombo, Tamara Beckwith, & Masha Markova Hanson

Sara Colombo, Terry O’Neill, & Tamara Beckwith

John Lin & Typoe

Sara Colombo & Miky Grendene

Candela Ferro & Terry O’Neill

Candela Ferro & Khotan

Candela Ferro

Criselda Breene & Suzy Buckley

Catherine Anne Markert & Rebecca Zedillo

Alessandra Soncini & Tamara Beckwith

TON: One of the first jobs I got in Hollywood was to photograph Fred Astaire. We went to dinner with him, and all he wanted to do was talk about The Stones, Beatles, Jean Shrimpton and all these people. Back in London, we used to sit and talk about what job we were going to get when this was all over because we were convinced it wouldn’t last. We never thought we’d be the dictators of fashion and photography and God knows what. When I met people like Fred Astaire, I suddenly realized, if Fred Astaire took this seriously, it must be for real. I mean I remember just sitting at this club with Keith Richards talking about ‘can you imagine Mick singing at 40?’ and laughing about it because it was just so funny. Those first 10 years were the best because it was so new. It was a shock to us all that we got through it all, and it never died out.

TON: From here I’m going to photograph Pelé, he’s going to be the World Cup star because the World Cup next year is in Brazil, and he’s the face of it. So they want me to do him in all the gear from the World Cup. But to be honest, there isn’t anyone I want to photograph right now because after you’ve photographed guys like Frank Sinatra, and Dean Martin, all those guys, they had something different. Today’s people haven’t got anything. I meet them, and they just haven’t got it. I’m sorry for them, really, because I don’t know what will happen to all that. There’s no magazines like Life anymore.

Terry O’Neill

WRE: How do you feel about the collaboration with NEST and being featured here?

TON: Oh I love it, it’s fab. I’m a great believer in coming to a designer place, because designers are the ones putting pictures in houses and all that. I’m really thrilled; it’s an honor.