The Beauty and the Best

IN THIS LARGE format book from Flammarion, 225 duotones are presented in eight clearly defined sectors: motherhood, appetite, work & play, out & about, rebellion, elegance, flirtation - and of course - love. Each section is accompanied by an essay from a leading writer on art and culture - and a most revealing insight into the Parisian woman’s psyche from Catherine Millet, the co-founder and editor-in-chief of Art Press, in an short essay entitled ‘Love’. Mlle Millet was eventually exposed as the author of The Sexual Life of Catherine M - a racy, graphic tale of promiscuous behaviour by a middle class intellectual - which caused a petite scandal five years ago. So clearly she writes from some position of authority.

Despite a roster of great photographers - including the ever present ‘anonymous’ providing a hundred years worth of great images - the real star of this book is Edouard Boubat (1923 - 1999). For it is the snaps by this Paris based artist that truly capture that indefinable, heady mixture of glamour, charm, ingenuous sexuality, unforced beauty and feline independence of the girls of French capital. Whilst Lartigue, Willy Ronis, Sabine Weiss, Charbonnier, Janine Niepce and the others ably distilled the essence of Paris into single images featuring the city’s women, Boubat seems to repeatedly succeed in capturing the inner spirit of femininity - the eternal Marianne - in the City of Light.

With a stirring introduction by feminist literary critic, Xaviere Gauthier, Flammarion celebrate the beauty and joie de vivre of the girls of Paris - and do it with grace, style and wit. It is easy to see why Paris is now the number one tourist destination in the world.