Pattie Boyd

Pattie Boyd was a successful fashion model in England during the 1960s and 1970s. In that time, she met and married both George Harrison and Eric Clapton, putting her in the enviable position of being able to take intimate photographs of some of the world’s great musicians who came into their lives. Amongst her visual archive she has many unique Polaroids and vintage prints never seen before. In the heyday of British rock, Pattie’s photography documented events, public and personal around the lives of Harrison, Clapton and their friends, including Paul and Linda McCartney, John Lennon, Ringo Starr, members of the Rolling Stones, The Who, Cream and more – performing, recording and partying. Complementing those are the warm and candid shots that could only be captured by someone with unfettered access to her subjects. “It’s a frame around something wonderful that I have observed,” says Pattie about her photography, at the same time acknowledging her unique place in the course of events, inspiring the timeless songs “Something”, “Layla” and “Wonderful Tonight”, meeting the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in India with the Beatles, and witnessing the roller coaster lives of the men with whom her own life was intricately bound. It actually took Pattie many years to discover her archive of images. “I didn’t want to open boxes of accumulated photos that I had taken over the years; I believed they would remind me of times of both sadness and happiness that I wasn’t ready to look at,” she says. “I left them for years until one day someone suggested I could have something interesting for an exhibition. I was so excited to find photographs that go back as far as 1968. Looking at them, took me right back to the moment I took them.” Pattie’s passion for photography has developed since that time and she has studied the great master photographers of the past. Her greatest influences are Bill Brandt, David Bailey, Frank Kappa and Ansel Adams. She has also studied printing techniques, enabling her to experiment with her images in new and exciting ways. She now explores many avenues in colour and black and white – landscapes, travel and flowers as well as celebrities and musicians. Pattie has been awarded an LRPS (Licentiateship of the Royal Photographic Society).
Pattie Boyd