The Art of Makeup

When Callaway first published Kevyn Aucoin 's The Art of Makeup in 1994, the book became an instant mega-seller and transformed the field of beauty, making Kevyn Aucoin a fashion world celebrity and a gay rights pioneer. Before The Art of Makeup, beauty books had been practical, yet pedestrian: low-priced and low quality. No one had ever seen a beauty book of such aesthetic quality and sophistication, in both form and content. The book was large in scale (1:1 life-size ) and as elegant as the women it celebrated. Simultaneously a memoir, a how-to guide for all make-up applications from the quotidian to the fantastic, as well as a collectible must-have art book, the book was a sumptuous gallery. A who's-who of photography's luminaries (Irving Penn, Steven Meisel, Michael Thompson, Patrick Demarchelier, Mario Testino) the book equally celebrated supermodels (Christy Turlington, Linda Evangelista, Christie Brinkley, Cindy Crawford, Naomi Campbell ); celebrities (Elizabeth Taylor, Gwyneth Paltrow, Janet Jackson, Raquel Welch, Sophia Loren, ) and everyday women, who discovered how to enhance their unique beauty through Kevyn's makeup mastery. His own story of humble beginnings in Shreveport, Louisiana, overcoming bullying and prejudice, his relentless dedication to his craft, and meteoric rise to fame, combined with his pure charisma, resonated deeply with women and men the world over and he became a fashion world superstar. But his life was tragically cut short in 2002, at the age of forty. Since his passing, his iconic status in the pantheon of fashion has only grown, with an eponymous makeup line and film documentary Larger than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story directed by Tiffany Bartok and scheduled to be released in 2018. This new edition of The Art of Makeup, newly designed and out of print for many years, will introduce Kevyn's timeless insight into the essence of feminine beauty to an entire new generation.