Six weeks before her death in 1962, Marilyn Monroe was photographed by Bert Stern for a Vogue magazine assignment. Two decades later, Stern published The Last Sitting, a book that pairs his photographs—including many that Monroe had rejected with bold red Xs—with his eroticized narrative of the sessions. Stern’s desire to strip Monroe bare, to possess her both physically and photographically is made explicit in statements such as:
You want to make love to Marilyn Monroe.
You would if you could. You will if you can. I saw what I wanted, I pressed the button, and she was mine.
These words expose Stern’s fixation on Monroe and reveal how widespread the cultural impulse to claim her body and image had become. He recounts photographing Monroe nude in bed in his makeshift studio at the Hotel Bel-Air. Exhausted and intoxicated after hours of posing and drinking champagne, Monroe eventually falls asleep. Stern decides to kiss her, briefly waking her. He continues to touch her beneath the sheet despite her refusal. Ultimately, he leaves the room but presents his choice to stop as an act of virtue, romanticizing the assault and concealing his violent desire.
I have disassembled Stern’s The Last Sitting, redacting his text, cutting, collaging, and rephotographing his images. Through fragmentation and abstraction, I weave a visual spell to protect Monroe from his fixed narrative.
