The world has been focusing  attention on  the swearing in of Barack Hussein Obama as President of the United States.  Me too.   But I have  also been reminiscing  about a letter I  received from the White House, dated the last day of Lyndon Johnson’s  presidency   January 20, 1969.

It was  from my friend, Yoichi R. Okamoto, Johnson’s official photographer. Oke was a  career civil  servant, a second or third generation American from Bronxville New York. He became the director of still photography for the U.S. Information Agency under John Kennedy when  that job was not highly politicised.  He knew good photography because he was a good photographer and wanted the world to see the U.S. through the eyes of good photographers.

At one point in his USIA tenure he was requested to  photograph Vice- President  Johnson at some official function, and Mr. Johnson was very impressed with the work…for good reason. When he became president, he requested Okamoto  as  his official photographer. There were rumblings from the Republicans about  Johnson’s ego, but a very distinguished group of U.S. photographers contacted the White House in behalf of Oke and he was confirmed for the job.

I’ll digress here because I want you to know about this guy. You could be standing next to him, camera ready as we always were those days.  You would see something worth shooting and you would. Oke would shoot too. That was a game we used to play….shoot the same scene at the same time and vive la difference when you finally got to look at the prints.  Oke  may have been third generation U.S., but his esthetic was very Japanese and the design of his work was  impeccable. I was in awe.

As you can see from my bio, I was very much opposed to the Vietnam war and this soured my relationship with  him until I realized what he was doing from his unique position as Johnson’s personal photographer. Here was an exceptional documentary photographer  with credentials  that included  the highest security clearance. He could be anywhere the president was and document events from the inside. That’s what he did  with incredible consistency and flare. What he produced is  a  unique  visual history of a president. Most of the work is at the Lyndon Johnson Library. Someday I would love to curate an exhibition of that work in Washington D.C.

At the end of the Johnson Administration I wrote to congratulate him on this unique project and wish him well once he left the White House. That’s when I got the letter of thanks dated  Jan 21,1969. He wrote it his last day in the White House.   Later when we talked on  the phone, he told me that his favorite Zimbel photograph  had hung in his office directly downstairs from the Oval Office during his tenure. I hadn’t known about this. That  photo had been banned by his wife from Yoichi’s home, but found a home downstairs from the President.

All of which makes me hope that President Obama  will find a  very talented photographer whom he will give leave to  seriously document of one of the most important periods in American history. No more photo-ops!

george

       Elaine and I wish you, your loved ones, your disaffected,  and even your enemies, a Happy New Year in 2009.

Kiss somebody– make human contact–Happy New Year !!

                george

  If  you want to know more about this woman, go to: elainezimbel.com

I was trying to decide which print I should use with my holiday greeting letter. After 65  years of shooting,.it should be difficult, but….it was easy:  “I’ll use the rooster”.  Don’t ask me where that came from;  also don’t ask me why I press the shutter when I do.  (MFA anyone?)

The point is  I want you to get pleasure from this image  and thank you for your friendship.  Elaine & I send you and yours  best wishes for the upcoming year.

That said I want to give you my  thoughts  about why I chose this. I think you would call it the backstory..
This rooster spent most of the year with the famous Bona Fide Farm chickens..big eggs, big yolks that looked like the setting sun.  He took good care of them.  They were even mentioned in a slick Toronto magazine…wow!  But  that’s surface stuff.

At four this morning I started thinking about why I loved this rooster.  Well, he “flew the coop” (an so did I);  he loved the hay loft in the big barn (an so  did I ) and he spent much of his time looking out at the world (and so do I).  I won’t go further..Elaine is the psychotherapist in the family.

In the New Year do  what you can to make the world better.  It ain’t easy.

george

I am happy to announce the acquisition of two of my photographs by The Museum of Fine Arts of Montreal for their permanent collection.

You will  recognize Marilyn in her white dress:  “The Energy, NYC 1954″,  but I must introduce you to our dog Lily: ” Lily & George in the Park 2004″  The latter is part of my ongoing “shadow” series. I have come to the conclusion  that photographers are more aware of their shadows than most people and  start to use them as a subjects.

As for one of my favorite Marilyns “The Energy” breaks a lot of rules..photographing directly into the kleig lights, letting the subject fall off the edge of the frame etc., all of which proves there are no rules. That is a very important rule. …george

Our gang -  Thanksgiving Day 1964

Sometimes I am called a sentimentalist, but I don’t care….george

After Harry Truman left Office, he and his Secretary of  State Dean Acheson would often meet at events honoring colleagues…in this case, I think it was Eleanor Roosevelt’s birthday party, (i.e.- a fundraiser for the Democratic Party….David Axelrod didn’t invent them, but he sure perfected them!)

Mr. Acheson still called Mr. Truman “Boss.”

When I took this scene 54 years ago and got escorted off the set I could not have envisioned that  photographs from that sesssion, printed by me would be at auction in the 21st century. But they are. The first, October 29 was at Drouot in Paris - Viviane Esders “Photographies”, and now (Dec 4) “Popular Culture” - Christie’s South Kensington London; then Hampel ’s Munich -  “Modern Art”  (Dec 6); followed by Friends of Friends Photo Auction, NYC (Dec 9); and finally Christie’s, NYC- “The Constantiner Collection( Dec 16 & 17).

Of course if you can’t stand the tension of an auction,  you can always browse and buy my Marilyns at any of my dealers. Tell them George sent you and see what happens.

To celebrate the election of Barak Obama and to recognize the financial wreckage of the  Reagan/Bush/Bush administrations I have decided to offer my extant 24″x20″ prints of Jacqueline & John Kennedy, NYC 1960 on sale. My first. These were printed by me in  2004 on Agfa Classic  SG 118  paper. It is no longer available. This photograph is in the collections of MOMA, ICP, TMMP, MFAQ &  CCAG.

I will discount these 20% which means they will be priced at  $2400 plus packing and shipping by Fed X.  This will be in effect until inauguration day 2009. I have notified my dealers so that you are free to order from them if you prefer . If you have been kind enough to have purchased this image, you can choose any of my political images at the same discount. ….        george

Last night, as we were listening to Obama’s victory speech I started  to think about “Little Joe Louis”.  I photographed him in 1953 in  the pediatrics ward of Philadelphia General Hospital; he would be  about 60 years old now.  We called him “Joe Louis”  because he put his dukes up every time you  talked to him. I am sure he had his reasons. Philadelphia was a tough town…the city of brotherly love wasn’t always so loving.

Could he have ever dreamed there would be a black president?  I don’t think so. He wouldn’t  have been dreaming about presidents when I took that photograph; he wouldn’t have been thinking about presidents when he was a teenager.  He would have been thinking about survival.

I hope he  did survive and was able to share “the moment”  when President-elect Obama gave the world his message of hope….george