The first definitive biography of Richard Avedon, a monumental photographer of the twentieth century, from award-winning photography critic Philip Gefter“Wise and ebullient.”—Dwight Garner, New York Times“Mesmerizing. . . . Like Avedon’s blank white backgrounds, blasted with light, Gefter’s pages expose in a controlled and intelligent manner all the bigness and littleness of one of the greats.”—Brad Gooch, New York Times bestselling author of Flannery and City Poet

In his acclaimed portraits, Richard Avedon captured iconic figures of the twentieth century in his starkly bold, intimately minimal, and forensic visual style, while his work for Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue transformed the ideals of women’s fashion, femininity, and culture, and definedthe look of an era. Yet despite his driving ambition to gain respect in the art world, Avedon was condescendingly dismissed as a “celebrity photographer.”What Becomes a Legend Most is the first definitive biography of this luminary—an intensely driven man who endured personal and professional prejudice, struggled with deep insecurities, and mounted an existential lifelong battle to be recognized as an artist. Philip Gefter builds on archival research and exclusive interviews with those closest to Avedon, revealing how the 1950s and 1960s informed Avedon’s life and work as much as he informed the period, and illuminates his circle of close friends, a profoundly influential group of artists—Leonard Bernstein, Truman Capote, James Baldwin, Harold Brodkey, Renata Adler, Sidney Lumet, and Mike Nichols—who shaped the cultural life of the American twentieth century.Balancing glamour and gossip, What Becomes a Legend Most is an intimate window into Avedon’s fascinating world and cements his legacy as one of the most consequential artists of his time.