RONNY JAQUES (1910-2008)

Marlon Brando, Harper’s Bazaar, 1947
gelatin silver print, printed later
signed (in ink, recto and verso); stamped photographer’s credit (verso)
image 10½ x 7¾ in. (270 x 197 mm); sheet 14 x 11 in. (385 x 278 mm); framed (410 x 330 mm).

‘Brando was appearing on Broadway in…. Streetcar Named Desire. As Ronny told it, when he entered the studio, he noticed – barely – a young undistinguished-looking man in a dark t-shirt unassumingly sitting on a bench. Thinking he was a messenger, Ronny brushed past him. He waited a while, then finally walked out in the reception area and asked the receptionist if anyone had showed up named Marlon Brando. She nodded toward the young man. Ronny ushered him into the studio, asking if he’d mind bringing the bench along with him.’ Fiori, Stolen Moments.

British-born photographer Ronny Jaques enjoyed a successful career as a staff photographer for New York magazines Harper’s Bazaar and Town & Country throughout the 1940s and 50s. Very little has survived from Jaques portfolio. ‘His black and white negatives were lost by a printing house;’ notes Fiori, ‘his colour work mysteriously disappeared. That left a small collection of prints, and whatever tear sheets existed from the magazines to which he had contributed.’