It is highly surprising that this British celebrity photographer, Richard Young didn’t end up in hospital considering he has attended over 30,000 parties and used 65,000 rolls of film over his 30 year career. Young left school at 15, and it seems based his entire career on Warhol’s saying:
‘every person will be world famous for 15 minutes.’
His first big break came when a colleague asked him to take photographs of a friend of his, that was John Paul Getty Jnr. Young spent the whole day photographing Getty Jnr, he was then advised to approach Fleet Street, and so the relationship with the British Press began…
The exhibition contains over 100 photographs and is divided into decades: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and also includes some recent work. Young’s early snaps are particuarly stunning: Elizabeth Taylor’s party for Richard Burton’s 50th birthday at the Dorchester Hotel, in Park Lane, London 1975; Sex Pistol, Johnny Rotten sneering into the camera in Notting Hill, west London, 1976; Andy Warhol vacantly staring into the lens, with his personal assistant wavering in the background at his famous factory in New York in 1977 and Jack Nicholson, at the Dracula Premiere party at the Claridges Hotel, in Piccadilly London, 1978, pictured alone, and looking devilishly handsome with his trademark raised eyebrows.
Young’s later photos taken in the 1980s, 1990s, 00s, however fall victim to schmaltz and tabloidisms. With snaps of Elizabeth Hurley wearing “That Dress”; Princess Diana, Prince Charles with Prince William newly born, emerging from St Mary’s Hospital, London, 1982, David Bowie, Elton John et al singing along at Live Aid in 1985 and of course Posh n Becks aka Victoria Adams and David Beckham looking very much in love, at the Nordoff-Robbins music therapy lunch, at the Intercontinental Hotel, Park Lane, London 2001.
Described by Lord Snowdon as
“one of the most important photographers of the 20th century,”
he could also be described as the “first paparazzi.”