Biltmore Hotel Pool
Slim Aarons · 1975
From € 250.00 Including VAT
About this work
Biltmore Hotel Pool, Santa Barbara, May 1975
From a great height you look down on a rectangular pool of clear turquoise, a few swimmers floating in it like dots. White umbrellas line the left side, and guests lie on loungers on the right. On the far side runs a white gallery with patches of color; behind it lie red roofs, tall trees and a distant mountain ridge in the haze. On the left stands a white tower.
In May 1975 white umbrellas stood along the pool of the Biltmore Hotel in Santa Barbara, California. The high vantage point turns the pool into a floor plan: a blue surface surrounded by crisp lines of tiles, chairs and shade. Precisely because the people are so small, you notice how full the edge is and how empty the water. The colored strip on the far side is the only place where the image loosens up.
- Photographer
- Slim Aarons
- Collection
- Slim Aarons
- Country
- USA
- City
- Santa Barbara
- Year
- 1975
- Reference
- 101949431
The photographer
Photographing attractive people who were doing attractive things in attractive places.
George Allen Aarons, born in New York, served as a military photographer in World War II and subsequently transitioned to print journalism. Whereas he previously documented the war, he deliberately chose the opposite subject: the leisure time of the rich and famous, in breathtaking settings.
His most famous photograph, The Kings of Hollywood (1957), encapsulates what he sought in all his portraits: glamour, charisma, and celebrity, captured in a relaxed manner.
Aarons won the trust of the people he photographed, thereby gaining access to some of the most intimate and candid portraits of the twentieth century. In 2007, Getty Images published the book Poolside With Slim Aarons , crowning his legacy.
- Born October 29, 1916 , New York
- Died May 29, 2006 , Montrose, NY
- Hulton Archive / Getty Images
