Achieving the colouration Yevonde desired was far from straightforward. When Yevonde was working in the 1930s, colour photography was still developing and in constant flux. Her process wasn’t consistent for a range of reasons. From the outset, Yevonde approached colour experimentally for its creative and compositional potential – often using coloured lights, filters and transparencies. Dwyer, Britta C. (13 November 2006). "The Zinkeisen sisters – Great Scotswomen (from The Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Women)". Heritage & Culture. Edinburgh University Press. Archived from the original on 7 August 2007 . Retrieved 17 April 2010. Most previous exhibitions have favoured Yevonde’s Goddesses Series. The planned show at the reopened Portrait Gallery, however, will broaden the scope considerably and include some newly discovered works. The show will explore Yevonde’s life and career through self-portraiture and autobiography, reflecting on the growing independence of women after the First World War and of the freedom that photography afforded her. Yevonde herself a modern independent woman embraced the commercial sector. Her intensely hued scenarios provide wry observations of the dual demands on readers of colourful new women’s titles.

The most striking image which comes to mind is Joan Maude (1932) with her fiery hair posed in red monochrome. However, I would argue her later series, ‘A Galaxy of Goddesses’ (1935), triumphs over everything else. She was inspired by the costumed guests at an Olympian-themed charity ball she attended that same year. Yevonde asked twenty-three women she knew within her social network to pose as mythical characters. ‘Lady Dorothy Warren as Ceres’ and ‘Olga Burnett (née Herard) as Persephone’ stood out to me for their use of composition and colour, but perhaps it was just the ancient history student in me which drew my eye. Goddesses and Others announced Yevonde’s move to Mayfair in 1935. Guests from a fancy dress ball and other female acquaintances were made-up, dressed-up, propped and preened, dramatically lit, cropped and composed to reimagine powerful female deities. Yevonde was a vivacious and adaptable photographer operating her London studio throughout most of the twentieth century. Feminist In the essay ‘Yevonde’s Goddesses’, included in the catalogue, Lizzie Broadbent writes: “Seen through today’s eyes, Yevonde’s images of (often) titled women dressing up and posing as goddesses might appear dated and elitist… However, through these works, Yevonde was reflecting and, to some extent, subverting contemporary trends in photography, design and society”. I walked into the Yevonde: Life and Colourexhibition at the National Portrait Gallery wondering what to expect. I felt ignorant ever having heard of her before when it seemed her work was all anyone could talk about. I wanted to understand the hype so I took my morning break and headed to the exhibition room.a b c d "Middleton [née Cumbers], Yevonde Philone [known as Madame Yevonde]". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (onlineed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)

Yevonde: Life and Colour opens at the revamped National Portrait Gallery on Thursday and will feature a comprehensive selection of works dreamed up by this brilliant artist across a 60-year-career. You’d be hard-pressed to find a more joyful show anywhere in the country. Narrative art, modernism, mythology and surrealism pervade Yevonde’s portraiture, still-life, commercial work and most obviously her fantastical Goddesses. Yevonde: Life and Colour brings the photographer’s works together for the first time in 20 years. With an abundance of reproductions, and featuring previously unpublished works, the book showcases her experimentation with a range of techniques and genres including color photography, portraiture, still lifes, solarization and the Vivex color process, and repositions her as a key modern artist of the 20th century. It also provides in-depth context for Yevonde’s images, considering their aesthetic and mythic references. Scholes, Lucy (19 August 2023). "A Riot of Color". The New York Review of Books . Retrieved 25 August 2023.

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In 1933, Madame Yevonde moved once again, this time to 28 Berkeley Square. She began using colour in her advertising work as well as her portraits, and took on other commissions too. In 1936, she was commissioned by Fortune magazine to photograph the last stages in the fitting out of the new Cunard liner, the Queen Mary. This was very different from Yevonde's usual work, but the shoot was a success. People printed twelve plates, and pictures were exhibited in London and New York City. One of the portraits was of artist Doris Zinkeisen who was commissioned together with her sister Anna to paint several murals for the Queen Mary. [8] [9] Another major coup was being invited to take portraits of leading peers to mark the coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. She joined the Royal Photographic Society briefly in 1921 and then again in 1933, and became a Fellow in 1940. [10] The RPS Collection holds examples of her work. Visual Arts - Artists - Madame Yevonde (1883 -1975)". British Council. 1998. Archived from the original on 22 February 2014 . Retrieved 16 October 2012.