Amanda Lear: The Art of Make Believe (2018)

The mysterious Amanda Lear has been a fashion model, actress, singer, author, TV presenter and a painter. During the late-‘70s, at the height of the disco-era, she sold over 15 million albums and 30 million singles.

 

Over the decades, Amanda Lear has frequently reinvented herself. She has been a keen propagator of false tales about her early life. She is indeed a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.  So, it is somewhat daunting to attempt to unravel the facts from the fictionalised accounts which she has enthusiastically woven. Lear has stated to the press that her father was, variously, Russian, French, or Indonesian: her mother, French, Mongolian, Russian or Chinese; her birthplace, Hong Kong, Switzerland, Hanoi, or, dramatically, Transylvania. Even her entry in Wikipedia provides several possible birthplaces. 

In 1964, the young Amanda Lear relocated to London to study at Saint Martin's School of Art, but was talent-spotted by French modelling agent Cathérine Harlé and dropped out to begin a modelling career. And her meteoric rise began. “And suddenly”, she tells me, “everybody wanted to work with me.”

In London in the swinging ‘60s, the beautiful, statuesque model was eagerly sought out by Yves Saint Laurent, Coco Chanel, Paco Rabanne,  Mary Quant, Ossie Clark. She had affairs with Guinness heir Tara Browne, and Brian Jones. She mixed with the cultural icons of the period, Maria Callas; the Beatles; Twiggy; Sacha Distel; Keith Moon; Anita Pallenberg (with whom she shared a Chelsea flat), Marianne Faithfull, Yul Brynner; David Bailey; Andy Warhol, Pablo Picasso – in short, Lear knew everybody. But her most important and enduring relationship was undoubtedly with Salvador Dalí, who was infatuated with the androgynous beauty.

“Dalí told me that when you meet somebody, kick him in the leg, because they'll always remember that. This taught me that if you want to make an impression, you have to shock people. Whatever you do - be a murderer, set fire to the hotel, say something that will really shock, talk dirty, whatever, do something that will attract attention.”  [http://foreveramandalear.blogspot.com.au/2010/07/amanda-lear-for-night-conducted-by.html

Over the next 16 years, Lear was Dalí’s lover, constant companion and muse; modelling for several of his paintings.

“Me and Dali were great lovers. Physically lovers, of course. Which was very unusual for me because I had always liked pretty boys … And, obviously, Dali was totally the opposite. He was much older than me. He didn't look that sexy. But somehow, he was a great seducer. He seduced me, and eventually got me into bed, and I became his lover. And all this was very surprising to me in the first place - to him, also. Because he kept saying, ‘I do not want to betray my wife. I am very much in love with Gala. I have never had a mistress before. Where will it all end?’ And I said, ‘Well, I don't know.’ And he would say, ‘Well, I can't have a mistress. It is absolutely unthinkable. It would be betraying my wife. So the only solution that I can think of is let's get married.’”

This suggested bigamy did not come to pass, however, because the couple could not find a priest who was willing to conduct the ceremony.

In 1973, Lear was dating Bryan Ferry (she tells me they were engaged), of Roxy Music and she featured on the cover of their second album, ‘For Your Pleasure’. This now-iconic cover features a ferocious-looking Lear, wearing a skintight, Antony Price dress and impossibly high stilettos, stalking through a deserted nighttime street, on the south-side of the Thames, holding a panther on a leash, in a scene that would surely have appealed to Dalí. When David Bowie saw the album cover, he immediately requested a meeting. They subsequently embarked upon a year-long affair. Lear appears in a spoken-word video with Bowie in late-’73, which was recorded in the lead-up to Bowie’s proposed stage show, to be based upon George Orwell’s novel, ‘1984’. The show never eventuated, but it later morphed into Bowie’s ‘Diamond Dogs’ tour and album, of 1974.

 “I taught him a few things - because he was a very fast learner. I remember teaching him about Fritz Lang, German expressionism, Salvador Dali, surrealism, all the things he was very eager to find out more about.” [http://amandalear_jukebox.tripod.com/indexnight_inteview.htm]

In turn, Bowie encouraged Lear to launch a singing career, which blossomed during the peak of the disco craze. Her disco hits, all delivered in her trademark, Dietrich-deep voice – half-sung, half-spoken - include: ‘Alphabet’, ‘Queen of Chinatown’, ‘Blood and Honey’, ‘Follow Me’. I well-remember frequenting the seminal Melbourne gay clubs, Mandate and the University Club, in the late-‘70s, and being mesmerised by these unique tracks which were saturated with the promise of illicit decadence and dark Eurotrash-glamour.

In 1979, Lear married antiques-collector, Alain-Philippe Malagnac, who owned Le Bronx, one of the first openly gay Parisian nightclubs. Dalí sent the couple a funeral wreath.

Malagnac had previously been the lover, and then the adopted son, of celebrated French novelist, Roger Peyrefitte. Lear’s marriage to Malagnac lasted for 21 years, until his tragic death in a fire at their house in Provence.

These days, Lear hosts television shows and stages exhibitions of her paintings, and she occasionally gives lectures on Dalí. In 2006, in Paris, Amanda Lear was made a Chevalière in l'Ordre National des Arts et des Lettres. 

“I think that love is the key”, she says, “My life has been filled with love, and I have still got lots of love to give, and love is very, very important.” [http://amandalear_jukebox.tripod.com/indexnight_inteview.htm]

There is a truly astonishing video clip, made for her song, ‘La Bête et la Belle’, from her 2012 album, ‘I Don’t Like Disco’. It features the then 75-year-old Lear, half-naked, writhing seductively on a bed in a Paris hotel room, sporting a body that any 30-year-old would envy. The dirty, twangy guitar is perfect accompaniment to the raunchy visuals. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qF_X5OtkDM]

 Amanda Lear is her own amazing creation: and, like all good works of fiction, she maintains her mystery to the end.