Photojournalist Bill Eppridge Has Devoted His Life to Covering "Wars, Riots, and Revolutions"-- and a whole lot more

The News Times

Fairfield Museum hosts photojournalist Eppridge show
Phyllis A.S. Boros, Staff Writer
Published 06:15 p.m., Thursday, May 26, 2011

In this photograph by Bill Eppridge, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy stands in front of a poster of his late brother, President John F. Kennedy, at a Democratic fundraiser at the Ohio Fairgrounds, Ohio, in 1966. This image ran on the cover of Life magazine on Nov. 18, 1966. The renowned New Milford photojournalist is now being honored with a retrospective at the Fairfield Museum and History Center.



Intrepid in his desire to document the world around him, photojournalist Bill Eppridge has devoted his professional life to covering "wars, riots and revolutions" -- and a whole lot more.

In a career that has spanned more than 50 years, Eppridge has managed to capture extraordinary moments in America's political and cultural history for the likes of National Geographic, Life magazine and Sports Illustrated.

His iconic 1968 photos of a dying Robert Kennedy -- lying in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor of the Ambassador Hotel seconds after being shot by Sirhan Sirhan -- are part of the American experience.

Also familiar to millions of Americans are his photos from numerous Winter Olympic games, as well as those from such seminal events from the 1960s and '70s as the Beatles' first visit to America, the Woodstock music festival, the Vietnam War and the funeral of civil right activist James Chaney in Mississippi.

The Life magazine photograph by Bill Eppridge captures the Chaney family leaving for the burial of James Chaney in Meridian, Miss., in August 1964. James Chaney was one of three young civil rights volunteers who went missing in Mississippi in June 1964, abducted by the Klu Klux Klan. Their bodies were found several weeks later in an earthen dam. A retrospective honoring Eppridge, of New Milford, is on view at the Fairfield Museum through Aug. 28


His landmark photo essay for Life that focused on Manhattan's former so-called "Needle Park" inspired the Al Pacino movie "Panic in Needle Park."

And now the renowned photographer has turned his attention to the evocative beauty of old barns found in and around New Milford, where he and his wife live.

More than 65 images from these and other phases of Eppridge's career are now the subject of a three-gallery retrospective at the Fairfield Museum and History Center. The exhibit will be on view through Aug. 28 as part of the museum's Images 2011 celebration.



New Milford photojournalist Bill Eppridge captured this 1971 photo for Life magazine at the start of the Barstow-to-Las Vegas motorcycle race, with 650 entrants, by standing on the skid outside of a helicopter at 500 feet above ground. The photo is included in Images 2011 at the Fairfield Museum through Aug. 28.


In addition to the Eppridge retrospective, Images 2011 also includes the museum's third annual Juried Photography Exhibition, featuring one gallery devoted to more than 70 photos -- all deemed noteworthy by a panel of four judges that included Eppridge --in student and professional/serious amateur adult divisions.

Born on March 20, 1938, in Argentina to American parents (his father was stationed there as a chemical engineer for DuPont), Eppridge spent his formative years growing up in Richmond, Va.; Nashville, Tenn.; and Wilmington, Del.

During a recent telephone chat, Eppridge said that he first became interested in photography at about age 10 for reasons that were anything but altruistic.

"Sibling rivalry -- that's the reason. I have this older sister who has always been a very fine artist. She draws, paints, sculpts -- and I can't draw a straight line. I wanted to do something (creative) so I could compete with her. So I went to her and asked her to show me how to use a camera, and she begrudgingly agreed," he recalled, laughing.

By high school, his interest in photography had blossomed into a full-blown passion. After a short stint at the University of Toronto, Eppridge headed for the University of Missouri's School of Journalism, where he graduated with a major in photojournalism in 1959.

In that same year, while still a student, good fortune would visit Eppridge -- and shape his life for years to come.

"I had this friend who was a horse" at a nearby farm, Eppridge said, as he began a story about shooting an award-winning photo for the cover of this college newspaper's farm supplement.

"This horse knew me . . .Whenever I would drive by, I'd always give him a lump of sugar." So Eppridge headed to the farm to photograph "his friend" when the newspaper's editor announced that he was in desperate need of a last-minute photograph. "But when I got out of the car, I slipped and I spooked him -- and he took off running."

Eppridge had the opportunity to shoot just one photo -- and that photo would become "Stormy, Columbia, Missouri, 1959," a dramatic photograph of a white horse charging through a field with "tornadic" storm clouds in the distance.

That photo won him the National Press Photographer's Award/First Prize Pictorial. And that award, plus the distinction of being named College Photographer of the Year, caught the attention of Life photography director Roy Rowan -- subsequently leading to his long affiliation with the magazine.

"Hard to say whether I made luck happen, or whether luck happened to me," he said, again laughing.

Eppridge said that he has always gotten great joy from plying his art and craft no matter the subject. But he noted that one of the most fascinating periods of his life was spending more than a year on the road with Bobby Kennedy, covering his presidential campaign for Life magazine. He says he came to admire Kennedy enormously -- "I thought he was the right man for the time" -- and documenting his assassination was terribly sad.

But Eppridge said he has remarkable eye-hand coordination (a product he said from playing lots of pinball in college) and shooting those iconic photos of a fallen Kennedy were instinctual.

Renowned in recent years as a teacher devoted to mentoring a new generation of photojournalists, Eppridge says he advises students to "never put that camera down . . . it always has to be with you. And you really, really have to want to do this.

"This is an extraordinary time in history . . . with ideas traveling around the world with incredible speed. It all has to be documented. It has to be done, and as photojournalists, we have to do it."


ANNUAL PHOTOGRAPHY SHOW

More than 650 images from about 220 photographers were submitted for consideration in this year's photography show. From that pool of entries, 71 works from 50 photographers were chosen to be featured in Images 2011 in six categories: abstract, architecture, landscape, nature, photojournalism and portraiture. A regional competition, the event is open to those who work or live in Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and New York.

Joining Eppridge on the judge's panel were photo editor Adrienne Aurichio, of New Milford; photographer Stephen Wilkes, of Westport; and photographer/teacher Thomas Mezzanotte, who was Fairfield Arts Center's 2010 Artist of the Year.

Taking top honors in the professional/serious amateur category is Sandy Gennirch, of Stamford, who presented two works: a nature photo, "Horseshoe Crab Ritual," and an abstract "Dry Docked." Her prize is a 10-day exhibition at Southport Galleries at a yet undetermined date.

Winner in the student division is Daria Lombroso, of New Rochelle, who submitted three portraits while a senior at Wesleyan University in Middletown. Her three photos are titled: "Jaime, White Plains," "Tomato and Cheese Sandwich, White Plains" and "Jorge and Andrew, Scarsdale." Lombroso will receive a professional review of her work by Wilkes.

UPCOMING EVENTS

In conjunction with Images 2011, the Fairfield Museum has scheduled several upcoming events including the following:

Screening of PBS American Experience/"Freedom Riders," about the civil rights movement, post-film discussion with artist Tracy Sugarman; Thursday, June 2, 7 to 9 p.m.; free.

"The Soiling of Old Glory: The Power of a Photograph" lecture by Louis Masur of Trinity College, Hartford; Thursday, July 14, 7 to 9 p.m.; $8, students $5.

Behind the Lens guided tours; Thursdays June 23, July 28 and Aug. 18; 10 to 11 a.m.; included with regular admission.

Family Day, with special activities for children, Sundays July 31 and Aug. 21, noon to 4 p.m.; included with regular admission.

The Fairfield Museum and History Center is at 370 Beach Road, behind Fairfield's Independence Hall (exit 22 off Interstate 95). Hours are Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., weekends noon to 4 p.m. Admission is $5, $3 for students 6 through 22 years of age and senior citizens; free for children 5 and younger. Call 203-259-1598 or visit http://www.fairfieldhs.org/.

"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