LONDON (AP) 鈥 A new exhibition of photographs owned by Elton John is everything one might expect from a star who has a fascination with image, a love of excess and a very large budget. Understated, it isn鈥檛.
The show, opening this week at , includes more than 300 pieces by 140 photographers selected from the vast collection of John and his husband David Furnish.
Covering the period from 1950 to the present day, they include iconic fashion shots by Irving Penn, Richard Avedon and Herb Ritts, portraits of stars including The Beatles, Frank Sinatra Marilyn Monroe and Chet Baker, and photojournalism capturing moments in history, from the Black civil rights movement of the 1960s to 1980s AIDS activism and the Sept. 11 attacks.
Newell Harbin, director of the couple鈥檚 collection, agreed that the sheer scale of the show is 鈥渁 lot.鈥
鈥淚t鈥檚 a little bit overwhelming sometimes, but it鈥檚 just wonderful," she said at a preview on Wednesday.
The exhibition is entitled 鈥淔ragile Beauty,鈥 a name chosen by John that reflects his ethos, said curator Duncan Forbes, the museum鈥檚 head of photography.
鈥淚 think key to Elton is the sense of vulnerability and fragility that underpins creative expression and human experience,鈥 Forbes said. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 the thing I think runs through the show.鈥
He said John had instructed that the exhibition 鈥渟hould be mischievous and it should be very serious.鈥
鈥淲hat we鈥檝e tried to do is create a really absorbing, big show about photography, but also relate it to who they are (and) the passions of the collectors,鈥 Forbes said.
The exhibition opens with elegant fashion photos from the 1950s, then gets into edgier territory with work by chroniclers of outcasts and rebels such as Robert Mapplethorpe and Nan Goldin, both artists John has collected extensively.
Many of the greats from seven decades of photography are represented, from Diane Arbus, Eve Arnold, Bruce Davidson and Robert Franck to Wolfgang Tillmans, Cindy Sherman and Ai Weiwei. There are several works by Associated Pres photographers, including Richard Drew鈥檚 haunting 鈥淔alling Man鈥 image from 9/11 and Julio Cortez鈥檚 2020 photo of a protester with an upside-down American flag amid unrest in Minneapolis.
John, now 77, began collecting photographs after getting sober in the 1990s 鈥 he later said he replaced alcohol with 鈥渁 much healthier addiction.鈥 He and 61-year-old Furnish have assembled one of the largest photo collections in private hands, amounting to more than 7,000 works.
They frequently loan photos for exhibitions, including some 200 for a in 2016 that focused on black-and-white photographs from the early decades of the medium.
Harbin said John and Furnish 鈥渃ollect from the heart.鈥
鈥淭hey collect what speaks to them,鈥 she said 鈥 and continue to acquire new works, though they have slowed down a little. The most recent piece in the exhibition was bought two months ago.
Many of the works are displayed in an often-changing lineup on the walls of their multiple homes. Harbin said the household had a running joke in Atlanta, where John had a home for many years, 鈥渢hat no one ever knew the true color of the wallpaper.鈥
鈥淚 had it frame- to-frame, and that鈥檚 how he wanted it done 鈥 so that the two of them could be engulfed in that creativity and that genius of these other artists,鈥 she said.
鈥淔ragile Beauty鈥 runs at the V&A from Saturday until Jan. 5, 2025.
