There are a finite number of non-debateably beautiful women born into this world. Often armed with flawless skin, hypnotizing eyes, raw sensuality, lush pillows beneath their chins and/or beautifully symettrical stems that fall into stilettos, they are worshipped creatures. There are even fewer of these creatures who have planted their stilettos on the expansive terra cotta of Earth, on the terra firma of The Runway AND before the unforgivably truthful tabula rasa of the camera lens. These are our "iconic" beauties; women who by virtue of how The Creator has put their lovely visages together warrant attention (whether they want it or not), inspire undying love (whether it is pure or not), demand devotion (from any number of demographics) and hone the skills of Beverly Hills plastic surgeons ("I want lips like Angelina!"). In some cases their mere existence leads to obsession by those mere mortals who feel they are lesser-endowed on the beauty scale. These are women who redefine what the concept of beauty is in the public consciousness forever just by virtue of the fact that they were born.
Yes, Grace Jones is indeed one of these women. So is the legendary Verushka. Add the ridiculously beautiful Sophia Loren to that list. While you're at it, "beauty-mutant" Angelina Jolie deserves more than a passing mention. Audrey Hepburn could fight it out with Halle Berry. The list would also include Naomi Campbell, Vanessa Paradis, Elizabeth Taylor and Iman.
However, this list couldn't possibly exist without the inclusion of one Donyale Luna.
Born Peggy Anne Freeman in Detroit in 1945, she superseded the rags to riches story of Diana Ross' meteoric rise through Motown by at least a decade. However (unlike "The Boss"), her life journey has not been turned into a Broadway play that gave way to a blockbuster movie that Beyonce, Jennifer Hudson and Anika Noni Rose would star in. Even if the planned documentary-style profile of Luna does eventually come into existence, the storyline of the movie "Mahogany" more immediately comes to mind; that of a woefully beautiful woman who leaves the confines of her ghetto upbringing to make her way in the topsy-turvy world fashion, where her kind of beauty would be celebrated by some and (much to her detriment) fetishized by most.
Luna's most commercial accomplishment (and perhaps her biggest source of anguish) was being the first black woman to appear on the cover of Vogue Magazine. As true fashionistas know, Luna booked the cover of British Vogue in 1966, a full eight years before Beverly Johnson would make history as the first black woman on the cover of American Vogue in the summer of 1974.
The cover shot would speak volumes about how Luna had to fight the establishment to pay homage to her kind of beauty- a photograph in which she covered her whole face with her hand, except for her boldly outlined eye. Reportedly, that shot was chosen so as to not offend the magazine’s regular readership. Maybe that's where Luna's reputed problems with her true lineage came from; she would often don blonde wigs and green contacts in desperate attempts to become "other"; she tried her hardest to convince anyone that would listen (in the press and beyond) that she was a mixture of Mexican, Chinese, American Indian and Irish blood-everything except African-American. Perhaps it was infuriating to her that despite all of her protestations to the opposite, through all of her accomplishments and through all of her runway "shenanigans" with fellow model and friend Pat Cleveland, she was still seen as only Negro.
The Luna/Mahogany story arc aside, if there were to be a comparison Ross' turn in that movie would be a poor choice. Luna's story was much more international. Lesley Hornby, on the other hand, would be suitable. Born on September 19th 1949 in the North of London, Hornby would morph into the Queen of Mod- Twiggy- courtesy of photographer Barry Lategan. Peggy Anne Freeman would meet photographer David McCabe during the same timeframe and reinvent herself in the form of Donyale Luna- courtesy of Donyale Luna.
Luna, like Twiggy, had "...the body of a starvation victim and the face of an angel". While Twiggy was being named "The face of '66" by British newspaper The Daily Express, Time Magazine in the U.S. had already named 1966 "The Year of the Luna". While Twiggy worked with acclaimed director Ken Russell and starred in his production of 'The Boyfriend' (which earned her the 1971 Golden Globe awards for "Most Promising Actress" and "Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy"), Donyale Luna was ensconsed in Andy Warhol's Factory with Pat Hartley and Edie Sedgewick. She would serve as Salvador Dali's muse ("She is the reincarnation of Nefertiti" he has famously uttered), appear in movies by Otto Preminger and make appearances in a Fellini film before the end of the decade. Adel Rootstein, whose mannequins have always been considered as the reflection of the "ideal beauty" (with likenesses of Twiggy, Sandie Shaw, Joanna Lumley, Janet Suzman, Joan Collins, Lord Patrick Lichfield, Marie Helvin, Dianne Brill, Yasmin Le Bon, Susanne Barscht, Ute Lemper, Karen Mulder and Jodie Kidd), would also create one that Luna would call her own.
Mary Quant (the "inventor" of the miniskirt) would flutter as Luna (like Twiggy) donned her designs. Jean Muir would swoon, having her seminal matte jersey dresses modeled with passion and conviction by the first black supermodel. Luna would then enchant Paco Rabanne and, later, Halston.
Although she invariably had problems being referred to as "Negro", Luna's exotic look of sun-burnished cafe au lait skin and high cheekbones is the prototype of quite a few of today's ebony beauties; a cornucopia of Beverly (both Johnson AND Peele), Naomi, Tyra, Miss Ross, Eryka Badu and even 'America's Next Top Model winner' Jaslene, this statuesque lovely remains an egg from which most of these 'chicks' would be borne; a woman who laid the groundwork for re-defining black elegance and regalness as a real alternative to the obligatory bubbly blonde it competes with.
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As tragedy often befalls most exceptionally beautiful women, Luna would leave this life early by way of an LSD overdose in 1979, at the age of 33...
