All photos © Cecil Beaton: The New York Years. Above: Truman Capote in Morocco, 1949.

From the 1930s, when he helped revolutionize fashion journalism, through the 1960s, when he launched headlong into the Pop art era, London-based photographer Cecil Beaton brought to New York City his own perspective—aristocratic, sexually ambiguous, and theatrical. At the same time, New York offered Beaton innumerable opportunities to reinvent himself and his career. Cecil Beaton: The New York Years, published by Skira Rizzoli,  features sketches, costumes, set designs, previously unpublished letters, and over 200 photographs and drawings, many in color and never seen before. The book documents Beaton’s most influential relationships with quintessential figures of the New York art scene, including Greta Garbo, his female confidant and muse, and Andy Warhol, who passed the torch of documenting the New York art scene.  Cecil Beaton: The New York Years is also currently on view in an exhibition at the Museum of the City of New York until February 20, 2012.

Audrey Hepburn in a costume for the film version of My Fair Lady, 1963 © Cecil Beaton Studio Archive at Sotheby’s.

Greta Garbo, 1946. © Cecil Beaton Studio Archive at Sotheby’s.

Marilyn Monroe, 1956. © Cecil Beaton Studio Archive at Sotheby’s.

Andy Warhol and Candy Darling, New York City, 1969. © Cecil Beaton Studio Archive at Sotheby’s

Self-Portrait on the Brooklyn Bridge, New York City, ca. 1929. © Cecil Beaton Studio Archive at Sotheby’s