Large Fierce Mammal

Lee Miller in the bathtub of Hitler’s Munich apartment on 30 April 1945, literally and symbolically washing off the filth of Dachau her boots have left on his mat. Click to improve the view.

“How they set it up. She cannot be shown nude (this is LIFE, not Man Ray); a figurine on the table does the trick. In front of the bath, her combat boots, ‘the dust of Dachau still on them’ according to Scherman. And at the back on the left, the portrait. It is a voodoo gesture, the sort her Surrealist friends would approve of, an all-American blend of sass, violence and sex. Nuts to you Führer! I am naked in your bath with my Jewish lover, we are taking your picture’s picture, we are stealing your life-force. The date is April 30th, 1945. In a bunker under Berlin, Hitler places a gun to his head.” ~ Lee Miller in Hitler’s Bathtub, The Economist, photograph by David Scherman

Elizabeth “Lee” Miller, Lady Penrose, was born exactly 50 years before me, on 23 April 1907. Beginning her career as a New York City fashion model in the 1920’s and ultimately moving to Paris in 1929, she came to realize her gifts and passions lay behind the lens. This article is festooned with links that will aid you, Goode Reader, in getting a grasp of the Life, indeed Lives, of this remarkable Woman, and I encourage you to explore each and every one.

Throughout WW2, Lee was employed as a war photographer by Vogue magazine from 1942 to the end of it all. Today though, we will step back from the wealth that was her life to focus instead on this singular photograph, offered as a perfect testament to ultimate disgust.

“As Miller traveled through Europe, especially Germany, her photographs became sharper, imbued with anger and disillusionment. Her resentment of the Nazis can be felt in the chilling intimacy of “The Bürgermeister’s daughter, Town Hall, Leipzig, Germany, 1945,” in which Regina Lisso, the daughter of the City Treasurer of Leipzig, lies dead, flopped over an armchair after committing suicide with her parents. The text adds that Miller commented on Lisso’s “extraordinarily pretty teeth,” revealing her caustic wit. The photographer’s hatred is most pronounced in “Lee Miller in Hitler’s bath, Hitler’s apartment, Munich, Germany, 1945,” taken with her colleague David Scherman on the day of Hitler’s death, hours after she had visited Dachau. Miller brought mud from the concentration camp into the dictator’s bathroom — once a private, now very public space — with her boots, which she left on a soiled rug. Next to a portrait of Hitler, and amid the mess he’s made, she sits in the tub and washes herself. By appearing in the photo, Miller breaks out of her role as observer and reprises her work as a model at a crucial moment. She strikes back at the dictator in her own way, crossing a personal boundary in order to express a disgust that she can’t contain.” ~ Lee Miller’s Photographs Frame the Women of World War II

After her bath, she slept in his bed. Being in the company of her Jewish lover on that day though, I would like to believe sleeping wasn’t all she did. The ultimate wet spot.

Never forget.