Kirkland Exhibit in Toronto

Canadian-born celebrity photographer Douglas Kirkland’s iconic 1961 images of Marilyn wrapped in silk sheets (as well as his 2001 remake with Angelina Jolie) are featured in a retrospective at the Izzy Gallery in Toronto, Canada, as Nigel Hunt reports for CBC.

“Kirkland recalled how, as a young photographer, he went to meet the movie star in her apartment to discuss ideas for the photo shoot.

‘She said: I know what we need. We need a bed, a white silk sheet, Dom Pérignon champagne and Frank Sinatra records. We don’t need anything more. And I’m going to be in that bed with nothing on!’

‘Could you imagine what a young man like me was thinking?’

That session produced several images that count among the most iconic shots of the much-photographed screen starlet.

For that, Kirkland credits the sexual energy in the room that emanated from his subject.

‘She was just under this white silk sheet, nothing on. And I’m a kid from Fort Erie!'”

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