With its extreme contrast and pointillistic use of photographic grain, Woman + Cigarette Holder, Ball, Waldorf, New York, is an exemplary image from William Klein’s signature body of work executed in New York in 1954 and 1955. It was illustrated in his seminal 1956 book, Life is Good and Good For You in New York, a riotous, hyperkinetic, and ultimately affectionate portrait of the city that juxtaposed photographs taken in elegant surroundings, such as Woman + Cigarette Holder, with those taken in corner bars and on the street. Like Walker Evans’s American Photographs and Robert Frank’s The Americans, Klein’s New York defied the established templates for photographic literature. And while it initially received a mixed critical response, like Evans’s and Frank’s books, it remains a touchstone for photographers and book designers.

Woman + Cigarette Holder, Ball, Waldorf, New York was published in 1957 in Camera Magazine with the alternate title, The Queen of Clubs.