Masquerade Ball Hosted by Comte Etienne de Beaumont

Carefully orchestrated and evocatively lit, an extravagantly costumed couple poses for Man Ray upon their entrance to a masquerade ball. The man’s cape and the woman’s structured skirt form the flattened shapes of a “black-and-white picture,” the duo’s self-proclaimed contribution to the evening’s theme of la mode de demain, or “tomorrow’s fashion.” The gentleman depicted is the impresario and host of the party, Count Etienne de Beaumont, whose winged figure frames Josefina Atucha, Marquise de Jaucourt, herself the doyenne of an important Parisian literary salon. Other guests photographed by Man Ray on the same occasion include Pablo Picasso, Nancy Cunard, Gerald Murphy, and Baron Adolf de Meyer. These and other attendees gathered to toast the launch of “Les Soirées de Paris,” a five-week-long series of theatrical events commissioned by Beaumont and featuring the work of Picasso, Erik Satie, Tristan Tzara, and Jean Cocteau, all members of Man Ray’s ever-growing Parisian artistic circle.