Skiing in high heels doesn’t look easy, but Elsbeth Juda wasn’t interested taking the path of least resistance. This exhibition of the photographer’s work at the Jewish Museum – which includes a photo of a high-heeled model negotiating the ski slopes – shows how Juda made a career out of crafting difficult-to-stage, ambitious pictures.
A Jewish refugee to Britain in 1933, Juda ended up working for The Ambassador, a magazine beaming images of high-shine UK goods and culture to the wider world at the time of post-war austerity. Juda’s job was to make herringbone horsey culture look like something to flash the cash for.
The photographs featured in this small but fascinating exhibition include a series taken in a Lancaster textile mill. Snap a bit of tweed and get on out of there, a less imaginative mind might have thought. But instead, Juda got Barbara Goalen – the lady known as ‘Britain’s first supermodel’ – out on the factory roof, protected from the northern chill by nothing but a huge sail of yet-to-be-cut fabric.
What you repeatedly notice from the photos is how funny Juda is. Like the best of fashion photographers, a lot of what she produced will make you grin. In one photo, two ultra glam women in capes strike Vogue-friendly poses to inspect an immense bull out on parade at a county show. In another, Kenneth Tynan swirls around his back garden in a matador cloak.
Along with training her lens on top-notch British produce, Juda’s photos are a who’s who of the great and good of ’50s and ’60s Britain. Along with Tynan, there’s Margot Fonteyn faffing with a hat, Henry Moore carving a sculpture, Winston Churchill plus a black dog, and Graham Sutherland with his portrait of Somerset Maugham. But whether or not you know the names, Juda’s humour, style and cleverness make these photos worth strapping on some sensible footwear for and heading out to see.