Weegee’s last major project was caricatures, distorted photographic portraits, of politicians. Weegee’s energies were focused primarily, although not exclusively, no politician or public figure was safe from Weegee’s darkroom antics, on the 1968 U.S. presidential elections.
Many people have wondered wistfully, what-in-the-world would Weegee make today with the current presidential candidates (and perhaps Photoshop). Some of these photos were exhibited and published, perhaps most significantly, and perhaps slightly psychedelically, in
See magazine in October 1968:
“I take pictures with my third eye – the inner eye that sees what lies beneath the surface of the subject. What some call a pictorial distortion may, in truth, be the reality. And what we call reality may be a distortion of the truth.” – Weegee
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Hubert H. Humphrey, ca. 1968 |
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Bobby Kennedy, ca. 1968 |
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Jackie Kennedy, ca. 1963 |
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Eugene McCarthy, ca. 1968 |
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Draft Johnson for President, ca. 1968 |
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Lyndon Baines Johnson (distortion), ca. 1965-68 |
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Pres. Johnson, ca. 1965-68 |
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Pres. Johnson, ca. 1965-68 |
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For President, Nixon, ca. 1961 |
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For President, Reagan, ca. 1968 |
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For President, Rockefeller, ca. 1966 |
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For President, Wallace, ca. 1968 |
(Photos © Getty Images / International Center of Photography, via
Fans in a Flashbulb)
It's refreshing to see someone actually make fun of democrats such as the kennedys. I thought that was unheard of, and one was only able to make fun of republicans. LOL.
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