Apartment Therapy New York | Christine Keeler & Arne Jacobsen

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Christine Keeler & Arne Jacobsen

We just stumbled upon "one of the most famous photographs of a chair ever taken." The Arne Jacobsen ANT chair was photographed by Lewis Morley in 1963 (actually, it's a fake ANT, but meant to look like the ANT anyway). The woman at the center of our attention is a high class call girl named Christine Keeler. Her affair at that time with John Profumo became the stuff of legend. The story is in the NYTimes today as Mr. Profumo died yesterday. It is as good now as it was then. So is the chair.

The saga titillated millions of Britons with tales of misbehavior that had all the hallmarks of a salacious thriller --- nobility and spies, call-girls and country estates, sex and suicide, guns and lies.

Of course, it is the chair that is important in this photograph. At the time, using this particular chair held great meaning. Arne Jacobsen's chair "stands in for modernity's steady erosion of privacy and class-derived privilege. Keeler would not have exposed nearly so much were she sitting backward on a piece of late 19th century baroque revival."

Or would she?

Here's another as well....

Comments (8)

Brilliant! Connecting a design moment with an historical political event -- Maxwell you are so au courant!!!

Where did you find these pictures??? I'm impressed!!!

posted by Frank on 2006-03-10 14:04:15

This tips of age but I remember the Profumo affair vividly. Now that was good scandal, still hot by today's standards.

And the chair, very hot with just 3 legs.

I have to smile sometimes when people say "mid-century modern" and I realize it was my mother's furniture, but this particular style is amazing and I love it all over again. However, living in a 50's, 60's environment is more fun when its your first time.

posted by jmarieb(jackie) on 2006-03-10 14:07:09

There are many hilarious parodies of these kitsch photos, including Dame Edna:

http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/1702-popup.html

And David Frost:

http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/1698-popup.html

posted by Jeffery on 2006-03-10 14:17:26

Does anyone know if there are prints of this photo available anywhere? I googled it and can't seem to find any. There's just something about this photo that is captivating.

posted by Chris on 2006-03-10 15:09:47

This was also the image that was used for the poster of the movie about the Profumo scandal that came out in late 80s early 90s (I'm a million years old). Joanne Whalley-Kilmer played Christine Keeler.

I looked it up on imdb "Scandal" 1989. Here's the poster which uses that image:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098260/posters

posted by Ruth on 2006-03-10 17:06:20

If someone could track down prints of all three photos (Keeler/Dame Edna/ Frost) and hang them side by side. What a striking conversation wall that would be.

posted by gekko on 2006-03-11 03:16:53

Have you seen these cardboard chairs with that photo? Fab.

http://www.artmeetsmatter.com/proddetail.php?prod=factum-keeler

posted by BB on 2006-03-11 09:35:39

It is not supposed to be the "ANT" but the "SERIES 7" chair, but still designed by AJ

http://www.fritzhansen.com/composite-120.htm

posted by Nil on 2007-01-06 15:02:08