“Donayle Luna was the first Black woman to be on the cover of Vogue. Why don’t we know more about her?”
This pointed question from the recently released trailer for Donyale Luna: Super Model will hopefully no longer be relevant after the feature-length documentary about Luna’s life and career debuts on HBO September 13.
Born Peggy Anne Freeman in Detroit, Donyale Luna went on to revolutionize the fashion industry in the 1960s and 1970s, becoming the muse to some of the foremost photographers of the 20th century until her untimely death at the age of 33 in 1979.
Though Luna was one of the first Black models who graced the covers of both Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar in Europe, today, most people have never heard of her.
Directed by Nailah Jefferson, produced by Melissa Kramer, Isoul H. Harris, Melanie Sharee and executive produced by Jonathan Chinn, Simon Chinn, Jeff Friday, Dream Cazzaniga, participants in the doc include Luna’s daughter, Dream Cazzaniga, husband, Luigi Cazzaniga, supermodels Beverly Johnson and Pat Cleveland; Vogue global editor-at-large Hamish Bowles; photographers David Bailey, David McCabe, and Gideon Lewin; and many more.
GBN highlighted Luna last February in our post GBN’s Daily Drop: Donyale Luna – the First Black Supermodel (LISTEN) based on our entry about her in the Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022.
We are looking forward to learning even more about this mostly unsung trailblazer in the global fashion industry.
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“Why didn’t we ever know about this….” Years ago, on a PBS NOVA program, I saw an interview with an African American rocket scientist who was the lead administrator on a NASA space exploration program of some sort. I thought the same thing: Why didn’t we hear about this woman before?