Charlie Chaplin with Chandelier, Paris, France, 1931

In 1929, a young Lee Miller began assisting Man Ray in his studio in Paris while pursuing her own photography. She quickly absorbed the Surrealist influences around her, producing many strikingly original works, including this wondrously dizzying image of perhaps the most famous comic actor in history, Charlie Chaplin (1889-1977). The year that this portrait was taken, the film City Lights—written, produced and directed by Chaplin—was released with great success. The film is still considered one Chaplin's most notable accomplishments and the American Film Institute has ranked it 11th on the list best American films ever made.
Vintage Lee Miller photographs are rare, and the present work appears to be the only example of this image that has come to auction. Adding to the distinctness of the work on offer here is the artist’s connection to the Jacobses. In the 1960s, the vibrant social circle that included the Jacobses, the Copleys, Man Ray and Juliet and other artists had become centralized at the home of Lee Miller and Roland Penrose, in East Sussex. Though Miller had abandoned photography by this time, Roz and Miller’s friendship flourished during this period and they remained close from there on.