Born to an unwed mother in England in 1918, his family emigrated to France and owing to his sexual identity and foreignness the stage was set in becoming a perennial outsider and an observer, Brian Stonehouse was the gay secret agent who survived three Vichy prisons and five Nazi concentration camps and went on to become one of the most prominent fashion illustrators of his age. He survived in part because he was able to draw the guards’ wives and mistresses in exchange for extra food and shelter. He was both charming and handsome and in one Concentration Camp became “friends” with an SS guard, who gave him protection . Immediately after the War, Stonehouse returned to Dachau to make sketches of the crematoria, in order to “bear witness”. It was while Stonehouse was acting as a witness at the War Crimes Tribunal that he met the American Major Harry Haller who persuaded him to emigrate to the US and begin his career as an illustrator. Stonehouse became one of the most sought after womens fashion illustrators but , during the 1970s, he began to experiment with his drawings and excelled at drawing male models, capturing the period’s sexiness and his strong hint of his own sexuality. Brian Stonehouse died of a heart attack in 1998 but not before living his life like a movie, with even having an affair with a Swedish film star.
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