As Brigitte Bardot celebrates her 90th birthday in September, she remains a figure of huge cultural significance with a complex legacy and an undoubted influence on popular culture. She caused femininity to be considered in a different way; a way that challenged society’s norms and forged a path for future generations of women to express themselves more freely. Her film work is up there with the best in French cinema. Always a woman of contrasts: a sex symbol who shunned glamour, a celebrity who yearned for privacy, and a superstar who chose activism over extravagant flattery. The true strength of her character is clear from her decision to move out of the spotlight at the height of her fame to pursue her wish to live an authentic life unconstrained by public expectation. Bardot’s love for animals was well-known even during her film career but only after she retired could she truly dedicate herself to this cause. Not content with merely finding new homes for cats and dogs, she used her fame and fortune to champion those who could not speak for themselves and established the Fondation Brigitte Bardot (FBB) for the welfare and protection of animals in 1986. From the 1950s, Irish-born photographer Edward Quinn lived and worked on the Côte d’Azur. In those golden years this was the playground of celebrities from the worlds of entertainment, art and business. The rich and famous came to the Riviera to relax. And it was here that Edward Quinn captured spontaneous and appealing images of Brigitte Bardot and a great number of other celebrities including Marlon Brando, Sophia Loren, Aristotle Onassis, Alain Delon and Jane Fonda.