PHOTO:Alice Springs

One day in 1947, a rising Melbourne stage actress walked into a small photography studio, looking to pick up some extra cash as a model. Expecting an old man behind the lens, she found instead a young European called Helmut Newton. June liked the look of the photos on the walls and Helmut liked the look of June. When his standard pick-up technique failed, he recruited her as his sales assistant. Within a year, they were married.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Maison Européenne de la Photographie Archive

June Newton, still acting under the surname Brunell, won the Erik Kuttner Award for Best Actress in 1956, an award handed out for excellence in theatre in Melbourne. Although she was finding success in Australia as an actress, Helmut was offered a year-long contract with British Vogue and the couple moved to London in 1957. While there, June found acting work with the BBC. Helmut did not enjoy his time there and the couple left England. In the following years Helmut found work with such publications as Jardin des Modes and Australian Vogue. By 1960 the couple settled in Paris and Helmut’s photographic career flourished. June’s work as a photographer began in 1970 when she stepped-in for her husband who had fallen ill. Helmut was scheduled to photograph a model for an ad when he came down with the flu. Unable to contact the model to cancel their appointment, Helmut gave his wife a quick lesson in photography and she photographed the model later that same day. As per a 1987 interview with June, she said that Helmut decided that she should use a different name professionally as a photographer “Because he thought one Newton in the family was enough. And if I didn’t succeed…” June’s chosen pseudonym, Alice Springs, came from the Australian town by the same name. She selected the name by blindly stabbing a pin into a map of Australia. Alice Springs did however find success, by 1974 one of her photographs had appeared on the cover of Elle magazine. Over her career, Alice Springs’ photographs have appeared in such magazines as Vogue, Elle, Marie Claire, Vanity Fair, Interview, Stern. Working first as a fashion photographer and later as a portraitist, Newton has photographed such famous figures as William S. Burroughs, Anthony Burgess, Catherine Deneuve, Graham Greene, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Mapplethorpe, Christopher Reeve, Diana Vreeland, Yves Saint Laurent, Brigitte Nielsen and Nicole Kidman. Throughout her photographic career, Newton continued to work as her husband’s art-director, acting both as editor and curator of Helmut’s work.

Info: La maison Européenne de la Photographie, 5-7 Rue de Fourcy, Paris, Duration: 24/6-23/8/18, Days & Hours: Wed-Sun: 11:00-20:00, www.mep-fr.org