Ahead of her 100th birthday, we're still learning new things about Betye Saar

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Betye Saar practically levitates into the room wearing a Max Mara jacket that resembles a bird’s plumage, with a butter-yellow silk Dior dress grazing the ground behind her and a cane in her hand.This is look No.

1 at the photo shoot for this story, and everyone in the room — producers, photo assistants, editors — stop to stare, little gasps mutating into big ones.Saar’s magnetism either comes from being one of the most important living artists of the last century, the fact that her 100th birthday is approaching or being a Leo.

In any case, every so often, she lets out a laugh that is so mischievous and exalting, or makes a joke that is completely disarming in its self-deprecation, and we all feel like we’ve won.You’re left anticipating the next time she will laugh like that.

It’s a Tuesday afternoon, and Saar has spent the morning in hair and makeup, a departure from her usual morning routine of painting watercolors or working in the garden at her home studio in Laurel Canyon, wearing whatever version of rustic-art-matriarch-casual she’s decided on that day.Stylist Erik Ziemba presents her with the option of two slip-on shoes — one, in an animal print, inspires the animated response of a little girl choosing a shiny pair of new Mary Janes for Easter: “Look at those!” Saar yelps in an elevated octave before slipping them on … And not two seconds later kicking them off.No warning or explanation needed, no questions asked.

We’re going barefoot.“You tell me how to pose because you work with models,” she says to photographer Gioncarlo Valentine, as a formality, maybe, because shortly after she launches herself into a variety of poses that makes it clear she understands exactly which way her body should take shape in the frame.Craning her neck into elegant lines, she sculpts herself into the rendering she wants.“I’m working with one now,” Valent...