"Over 40 years ago, in 1968, I photographed for LIFE a great tragedy"

Bill Eppridge: Robert F. Kennedy addresses a jubilant crowd, The Ambassador Hotel, June 5, 1968
©Time Inc.

The Westport News
Out of the Woods
Woody Klein

Published 10:10 a.m., Tuesday, May 24, 2011

I saw Bobby Kennedy -- again -- last weekend. The stunning collection of vivid black and white photos by famed photographer Bill Eppridge at the Fairfield Museum brought the late Democratic senator back to life for me.


The photos, which I never saw before, were published in Life magazine shortly after Kennedy was shot to death in Los Angeles on June 6, 1968, at the age of 42. It is not an exaggeration to share with you the fact that these moving images reignited mixed feelings about this complex man.

There is no better way to explain my feelings than to repeat here the words of Eppridge on a placard as you enter the museum. Eppridge wrote:

"Over 40 years ago, in 1968, I photographed for LIFE a great tragedy, and a vision of it has stayed with me for all of this time. Our country was going off course with a war overseas, racial inequality and far too much poverty in relation to the amount of wealth that existed. A man emerged to lead us out of this: Robert F. Kennedy. For the short amount of time that he existed on earth he inspired a generation who to this day remember the excitement and hopes that he brought. He died too young, too tragically."

Just after midnight on June 5, 1968, Bobby Kennedy was shot in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles following his victory in the California presidential primary that clinched his Democratic nomination for president. He died 26 hours later.

My thoughts always turn to Bobby Kennedy at this time every year. His death, which will be commemorated on Monday, June 6, became a memorable part of my life as a reporter in October of 1965 when I was working as a TV journalist for WCBS. I managed to get an exclusive interview with him on a visit to what was then called "the worst slum building" in New York City -- 311 East 100th Street.

Kennedy's staff arranged for the interview specifically because of the reputation of this one building which, I pointed out, deserved symbolic attention from a man who had spent the latter part of his political life focusing on the poor. Prior to that time, I had never met him.

He picked me up in his two-door car at WCBS on West 57th Street. He was sitting in the passenger seat up front. I got in the back directly behind him. He greeted me with barely a smile, then turned has head towards me as we made our way up the East Side Drive.

"What's in this for me?" he asked, staring directly at me.

"A story and photo of you showing you care about the poor," I answered directly.

"And what's in this for you?" he continued.

"An exclusive TV story for tonight's news with Bobby Kennedy," I replied.

"Fine," he said in his clipped tone. That seemed to satisfy him.

When we arrived at East 100th Street, we got out of his car and I pointed the building out to him. Before going in, however, he immediately reached for a football inside his car and began to toss it around to some of the Puerto Rican kids on the street. There was a lot of excitement.

Obviously, they knew who he was. When I told him I'd like to interview him, he dropped the football and climbed atop his car, extending his hand for me to follow. I made it up there, microphone in hand while my crew waited patiently nearby.

I turned to him and asked him a question. Before answering, however, he grabbed the mike and pointed it towards his face rather than mine. "This is the way you do it, Woody," he told me, knowing that I had left the New York World Telegram & Sun after a decade and was just starting as an on-air TV reporter.

Momentarily embarrassed, I conducted our interview on the roof of his car for a few minutes. Without warning, he jumped to the ground and told me to follow him up the stairs of the run-down tenement. No sooner had he arrived at the front step when he saw a little boy with the strings to both of his shoes untied. Kennedy got down on one knee and carefully tied bows on each shoe, knowing the cameras were rolling. This guy is a real pro and a showman, I thought to myself. Our interview aired that evening and I got a few "atta-boys" at the WCBS studios.

Segue now, if you will, to a few months later in January 1966. I was playing a new role as press secretary to New York Mayor John V. Lindsay. The Transport Workers Union, led by the fiery Mike Quill, had gone on strike at midnight New Year's Eve. The first weeks were chaotic as New Yorkers tried to find ways to get to work. On January 12, Lindsay called me on our intercom and told me: "Bobby Kennedy's secretary called me and said he may be coming in sometime this afternoon to try and help solve the strike. Let's clear the decks for him."

Less than a half hour later, Kennedy made his way through the swarming press crowd and into the mayor's outer office. I walked in and sat down next to him.

"Hello, Senator, it's good to see you again," I said shaking his hand. After several awkward minutes, I found myself saying something quite personal to him: "I just want to tell you, Senator, in case I never get another opportunity, that I had a great deal of admiration and respect for your brother." He replied, turning to me: "Thank you," in a barely audible voice.

After we had waited for about 10 minutes, Kennedy said, matter-of-factly: `Tell your boss that I am not going to cool my heels out here much longer. Either we go in now or I leave." I quickly got up and delivered that ultimatum to Lindsay, who was sitting behind his desk deliberately, I thought, keeping Kennedy waiting.

When I delivered Kennedy's message Lindsay told me to usher him in. We entered Lindsay's office, Lindsay extended his hand and smiled to Kennedy: "Hello, Bob, it's good to see you again." That was exactly the opposite of how Lindsay felt, I knew, because the media already had speculated that the two politicians would be running for president against each other someday. (Kennedy ran in 1968, Lindsay, as a Democrat, unsuccessfully, in 1972.)

Kennedy spoke first. --"Well, tell me what it is all about, John. How has it been going?"

Lindsay then recited all the reasons why the strike occurred and paced the floor of his office as Kennedy sat motionless, firing questions at him. He told the senator that he thought the strike would last for another day or two.

In fact, there was an agreement with the union the very next day. The ensuing press conference was brief, not especially informative, and cold.

That was the last time I saw or talked with Bobby Kennedy.

Related: Bill Eppridge: An American Treasure

BOB DYLAN AT 70

Bill Eppridge: Bob Dylan with Pete Seeger, Newport Folk Festival, 1964

Don Hunstein: Bob Dylan and Suze Rotolo, New York, 1963

Elliot Landy: Bob Dylan, Infrared, Woodstock, 1968

Elliot Landy: Bob Dylan, Woodstock, (Nashville Skyline), 1969

Ken Regan: Bob Dylan, 1975

Ken Regan: Bob Dylan and Bruce Sprinsteen meet for the first time, backstage, New Haven, CT, 1975

Ken Regan: Bob Dylan and Allen Ginsberg at Jack Kerouac's grave, Lowell, MA, 1975

For 50 years, Bob Dylan has inspired musicians and songwriters, politicians and protesters, presidents and popes. Robert Allen Zimmerman was born in St. Mary's Hospital on May 24, 1941, in Duluth, Minnesota.  Explaining his change of name in a 2004 interview, Dylan remarked: "You're born, you know, the wrong names, wrong parents. I mean, that happens. You call yourself what you want to call yourself. This is the land of the free".

Guardian UK slide show

Remembering ICP's Founder Cornell Capa today on the anniversary of his death

Cornell Capa by Alfred Eisenstaedt

"The idea that photography can't be personal is madness!...I see something, it goes through my eye, brain, heart, guts. I choose the subject. What could be more personal than that?" -- Cornell Capa (April 10, 1918 – May 23, 2008)

Via Magnum Photos

Accomplished Magnum photographer Cornell Capa passed away early on the morning of May 23rd at home in New York.


Cornell Capa was born Cornell Friedmann to a Jewish family in Budapest. In 1936 he moved to Paris, where his brother Andre (Robert Capa) was working as a photojournalist. He worked as his brother's printer until 1937, then moved to New York to join the new Pix photo agency. In 1938 he began working in the Life darkroom. Soon his first photo-story - on the New York World's Fair - was published in Picture Post.

In 1946, after serving in the US Air Force, Cornell became a Life staff photographer. After his brother's death in 1954, he joined Magnum, and when David 'Chim' Seymour died in Suez in 1956 Capa took over as president of Magnum, a post he held until 1960.

Capa made an empathetic, pioneering study of mentally retarded children in 1954, and covered other social issues, such as old age in America. He also explored his own religious tradition. While working for Life, Capa made the first of several Latin American trips. These continued through the 1970s and culminated in three books, among them Farewell to Eden (1964), a study of the destruction of indigenous Amazon cultures.

Capa covered the electoral campaigns of John and Robert Kennedy, Adlai Stevenson and Nelson Rockefeller, among others. His 1969 book, New Breed on Wall Street, was a landmark study of a generation of ruthless young entrepreneurs keen on making money and spending it fast.

In 1974 Capa founded New York City's influential International Center of Photography, to which for many years he dedicated much of his considerable energy as its director.

The Art Market: Copyright or Wrong?

Via The Financial Times

By Georgina Adam
Published: May 20 2011 22:23


Copyright infringement is a hot issue today with Britain poised for a radical shake-up of its law on the subject. In the art market – and in the law courts – it is already squarely on the agenda as more artists incorporate “appropriation” (read: copying) into their practice. Photographers, in particular, are protesting and, in a recent high-profile case, both Richard Prince (king of appropriation) and his gallery Gagosian were found guilty of violating photographer Patrick Cariou’s rights. Prince made collages using Cariou’s images of Jamaican Rastafarians but barely changed them. An appeal is pending.

Matters went the other way in another case just settled. The European court in The Hague has thrown out a suit brought by the French luxury goods group LVMH against Nadia Plesner, a Dutch art student. In her painting “Darfurnica”, Plesner showed a starving African child clutching a swanky Louis Vuitton “Audra” handbag. Inspired by Picasso’s “Guernica”, the work is designed to draw attention to the conflict in Darfur and western indifference to it. It was put on sale in a Danish gallery for €67,000.

Vuitton accused Plesner of copyright infringement and won the initial case against her in January. She was fined almost €500,000 for continuing to display the painting. Vuitton had previously stopped Plesner showing a similar image on T-shirts and posters. But this time the artist fought back and the court has reversed the decision, ruling that the artist’s freedom of expression outweighed the importance of Vuitton’s protection of property. Plesner doesn’t have to pay the fine, the picture can be exhibited publicly and Vuitton has to pay part of her costs. “We [artists] have won back our freedom to make reference to the modern society we live in,” said Plesner. Her painting is currently on display at the small Herning Museum of Contemporary Art in Denmark. Because of the increased public interest, the show has been extended to June 19.

Related: APPROPRIATION: PHOTOGRAPHY, ART, AND "STEALING"

Freedom Riders museum opens in Montgomery, Alabama

Paul Schutzer: Freedom Riders Julia Aaron & David Dennis sitting on board interstate bus as they and 25 others are escorted by 2 National Guardsmen holding bayonets, on way from Montgomery, AL to Jackson, MS, May, 1961

The Associated Press

Friday, May 20, 2011
4:43 a.m.

Montgomery's former Greyhound Bus Station is reopening as a museum honoring the Freedom Riders on the 50th anniversary of the day they were attacked in the capital city.

The Alabama Historical Commission has prepared the museum in downtown Montgomery and says several of the original Freedom Riders, including Georgia Rep. John Lewis, are scheduled to attend the dedication at 10 a.m. Friday. (Full schedule here.)

The Freedom Riders were trying to integrate Southern bus stations when they arrived in Montgomery on May 20, 1961. They were beaten by an angry white mob because no law enforcement officers were on hand.

The new museum is a few blocks from some of Montgomery's other civil rights attractions, including the Rosa Parks Library, the Civil Rights Memorial and the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church.



----On the 50th anniversary of a night when a savage mob trapped Riders and others in a church in Montgomery, Alabama -- with no guarantee that they would not torch the church and everyone inside -- LIFE.com looks back at one of the most terrifying, and pivotal, moments

END OF WORLD MAY 21?

Steve Schapiro: The Worst is Yet to Come, New York, c. 1968

US preacher warns end of the world is nigh: 21 May, around 6pm, to be precise

Steve Schapiro: Supermarket Protests, New Jersey, 1963

Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little on May 19, 1925 in Omaha, Nebraska

Gordon Parks: Malcolm X Addressing Black Muslim Rally in Chicago, 1963

"May 19th is the date one of the most influential and greatest African Americans in history was born, El Haaj Malik El-Shabazz, known to us as Malcolm X.

Today marks what would be the civil rights activist's 86th birthday. He was many things to many people, but he was nothing short of legendary. He is credited with pushing for democracy in modern Black America, spreading Islam in black communities and boosting the morale of African Americans.

He once said he wanted 'to bring about the complete independence of people of African descent here in the western hemisphere...and bring about the freedom of these people by any means necessary.'"

-- The Oficial Malcolm X Website

Bob Gomel: Black Muslim leader Malcolm X photographing Cassius Clay, Miami, 1964







The Man with a Camera: A Night with Bill Eppridge

Bill Eppridge runs alongside a car carrying Robert Kennedy

 © Burton Berinksy.

Fairfield Museum and History Center
Thursday, May 19 7-9:00 pm

$8; Members and Students, $5
To register in advance, call 203-259-1598.

Take a march through time as former Life magazine photographer Bill Eppridge shares stories about his illustrious career spanning more than five decades. Eppridge’s iconic images are a testament to the importance of photojournalism in documenting history and range from the Civil Rights movement to the powerful image of a dying Robert F. Kennedy cradled in the arms of a busboy. His stories will inspire young and old along with a new generation of photographers.



At 8:32 Sunday Morning, May 18, 1980, Mount St. Helens Erupted

Bill Eppridge: Mt. St. Helen's Survivors, July, 1980




Shaken by an earthquake measuring 5.1 on the Richter scale, the north face of this tall symmetrical mountain collapsed in a massive rock debris avalanche. In a few moments this slab of rock and ice slammed into Spirit Lake, crossed a ridge 1,300 feet high, and roared 14 miles down the Toutle River.


The avalanche rapidly released pressurized gases within the volcano. A tremendous lateral explosion ripped through the avalanche and developed into a turbulent, stone-filled wind that swept over ridges and toppled trees. Nearly 150 square miles of forest was blown over or left dead and standing.

At the same time a mushroom-shaped column of ash rose thousands of feet skyward and drifted downwind, turning day into night as dark, gray ash fell over eastern Washington and beyond. Wet, cement-like slurries of rock and mud scoured all sides of the volcano. Searing flows of pumice poured from the crater. The eruption lasted 9 hours, but Mount St. Helens and the surrounding landscape were dramatically changed within moments.

A vast, gray landscape lay where once the forested slopes of Mount St. Helens grew. In 1982 the President and Congress created the 110,000-acre National Volcanic Monument for research, recreation, and education. Inside the Monument, the environment is left to respond naturally to the disturbance.
--Mt. St. Helens National Volcanic Monument

Museum Exhibit Surveys Relationship of Painting to Photography

Jackie, 1964.

Acrylic and silkscreen ink on linen, 20 x 16 inches.

The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh. Founding Collection,

Contribution The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc.

© 2010 The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

 

Shared Intelligence: American Painting and the Photograph

May 20, 2011 - September 11, 2011
The Georgia O'Keeffe Museum
Curators: Jonathan Weinberg and Barbara Buhler Lynes



Shared Intelligence will be the first major museum exhibition to survey the fraught but highly productive relationship of painting to photography in 20th-Century American Art. It brings together approximately 75 photographs and paintings by such artists as Robert Bechtle, Chuck Close, Thomas Eakins, Sherrie Levine, Georgia O’Keeffe, Cindy Sherman, Charles Sheeler, Ben Shahn, Edward Steichen, and Alfred Stieglitz for whom the two mediums were essential to their practices.


In opposition to Modernist critics such as Clement Greenberg and John Szarkowski, who have tried to establish the autonomy of painting and photography, a crucial theme of this exhibition is the way in which the two mediums have always intersected and spilled into each other. The camera has been used repeatedly to reinvigorate painting, even as photography has been frequently enriched by a dialogue with painting.

Whereas in the beginning of the 20th Century photographers felt obligated to justify their use of the camera as a means of expression, today the question is no longer, can photography be the equal of painting but rather has the photograph, and photo-based images, supplanted painting’s position in the hierarchy of the art world. Certainly it is nearly impossible to imagine a contemporary artist whose work is untouched by the camera, if only as a means of reproduction. And yet the photograph’s role in modern art goes far beyond reproduction or even as a source of subject matter. Photographic seeing, the way the lens freezes, flattens, enlarges and crops the world conditions all visual representations. Above all there is no way of escaping the photographic archive, the camera’s service to the vast legal, scientific and economic systems of knowledge that categorize and regulates modern existence itself.

Central to the exhibition will be the role of the crop and the close up in the modernist figurative tradition. O’Keeffe’s early work cannot be separated from the photographic practice of her husband, Alfred Stieglitz and the other photographers he represented. Her use of the close up in her paintings, while not literally based on particular photographs, responded to and influenced the photographs of Stieglitz and of Paul Strand. Certainly Stieglitz and his collaborator, Edward Steichen, were profoundly influenced by contemporary painting and collage (Steichen began his career as a painter).

The exhibition will pair paintings and photographs in which the visual relationship is both compelling and intrinsic to the creative process. How did Ben Shahn translate his photographs of a store window into a painting of the same subject? What elements did David Hockney take from his photographs of pools and swimmers in order to create a painting of a boy diving into the water? How does Chuck Close obsessively grid out and copy his source material so that in the end the process itself becomes an essential part of the work’s meaning? The aggregate result of the exhibit will be to refute the idea that painting from a photograph is some sort of failure of imagination or technique—rather the two mediums enrich each other. Ultimately, the exhibition will emphasize the role of the artist as picture maker, rather than as either painter or photographer.

Museum information and tickets here.