“I was a post-war girl, eager to finally see something of the world. And so in 1950 I moved from Göttingen to Hamburg where I learnt the basics of photography. I was a lively young thing too, and was able to earn a bit of money modelling. One day I was riding my bike through Pöseldorf when a fancy white car pulled up beside me. The man at the wheel pointed to my camera and asked if I was a photographer. It turned out tobe Hans Huffzky, founder of the magazine Constanze. When I showed him my photos all he could say was ‘This is awful! You’ve got to stop taking snapshots of ships in the harbour and start photographing people.’ From that moment Huffzky became my personal Professor Higgins, and introduced me to Rudolf Augstein and Axel Springer who at the time were still on their way up in the publishing world and were very easy-going. Back then it was all somehow easier to shoot for the stars and take on the world …”

Alongside her photographic skills and movie-star good looks, it was Inge Feltrinelli’s uncanny knack of being at the right place at the right time which again and again opened doors for her to the most rich, intelligent and famous personalities of her time. Feltrinelli’s legendary pictures reveal the informal if not friendly relationships she enjoyed with her subjects – from Marc Chagall to Simone de Beauvoir and Gary Cooper, who casually sips his drink as if oblivious to Feltrinelli’s lens before him.