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1933, Ireland.
Died in London in 2010.
Photographer. Duffy never intended becoming a photographer.
Studying dress design at Saint Martins College of Art, Duffy
pursued brief stints in fashion design and illustration before
turning his hand to photography in the late 1950s. Cutting his
teeth as fourth assistant to Adrian Flowers, Duffy picked up
his first commission from the Sunday Times in 1957, the year
that he started at Vogue. Quickly becoming a Vogue favourite,
Duffy’s avant-garde style was instrumental in pushing
the formerly society-led magazine to remain relevant as the
teenage revolution ensued. Duffy ushered in a new style of documentary
fashion photography alongside his ‘Black Trinity’
contemporaries David Bailey and Terence Donovan. Together they
pushed aside the stuffy conservatism of the fifties in favour
of a more innovative and energetic approach that perfectly fitted
post-war ‘swinging London’. By 1961 Duffy started
working for French Elle, where he believes he did his best work.
Inspired by a culture that encouraged experimentation and subversion,
Duffy remained working with Elle for nearly 20 years, alongside
many other publications around the world. Duffy, Bailey and
Donovan heralded a new era where the photographer was the star.
Setting up his own studio in 1963 at his family home in Swiss
Cottage, North London, Duffy captured the mood and ever-changing
cast of rock stars, actors, models, writers, and politicians
of the day in his innovative and dynamic style. Duffy’s
avant garde style is evident in the award-winning commercial
commissions he delivered at the height of his career. Duffy
became one of the few photographers to shoot two Pirelli calendars
in both 1965 and 1973. He also shot three record sleeves for
David Bowie, including the now iconic Aladdin Sane. Surreal
campaigns for Benson & Hedges and Smirnoff Vodka are some
of Duffy’s most recognisable commercial work. Created
before the advent of digital trickery, these ingenious shots
were a result of his detailed understanding of metaphysical
photography, as well as often dangerous set-ups that would be
impossible to recreate today. By 1979, Duffy was one of the
biggest names on the London photographic scene. Known only by
his last name, his fame eclipsed that of those he photographed.
That was until one day in 1979 when Duffy took his transparencies
and negatives into his garden and set them alight in a ceremonial
finale to his career as a photographer, having felt he had said
all he could say through the medium. Drawing on the revived
archives lovingly restored by his son in recent years, this
artworks and book re-ignite the legacy of a creative visionary
whose work both documented and defined the time in which it
was created.
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