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[cheering crowds]

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Zimbel: November 21st, 2000.

Dear Barbara and Maggie, I
currently have a retrospective

at Sala Millares in Madrid
and on the swing back,

stopped at Paris Photo,

where several of my
dealers had booths.

My wife saw your
booth and suggested

that I might have some
prints in that collection.

Although I have freelanced
for the New York Times

for over forty years,

I said no because I always
sell one-time rights,

and the Times does not
own any of my work.

Surprise! Number 122,
George S. Zimbel,

Jacqueline and John
Kennedy, New York City, 1960,

eight by ten print
described as vintage,

price, U.S. four
thousand dollars.

I have not authorized the
sale of any of my work

through the New York Times

and would like that print and
any others that you may have

of mine returned safely to
me at the address below.

Thanks for your
attention to this matter.

Yours truly, George S. Zimbel.

November 28, 2000.

Dear Mr. Zimbel, I am counsel
for the New York Times Company.

Your November 21, 2000
email to Barbara Cox

has been referred to
me for a response.

You assert in your letter that
all physical photographs

taken by you and
submitted to the Times

for one-time reproduction
are not owned by the Times.

We disagree.

Our understanding has
always been that title

to the physical prints
passed to us upon payment

to you for the right to
reproduce the photo.

This understanding is reflected
both in our practice

of retaining or
disposing of prints

without the involvement
of photographers

and in the fact that
in the many years

since we first acquired
the photographs,

you have never before seen fit
to request their return

or otherwise challenge
our ownership.

Indeed to accept your position,

one must believe that
for all these years

the Times has been providing
free storage for your property.

In sum, it is our position
that we own the prints

you refer to in your letter.

Therefore, we decline to
comply with your request

that we first comb our
extensive archives

for photographs from
you and then return them.

Please feel free to
contact me in the event

that you have further questions.

Very truly yours,
Maggie R. Drucker.

**

Zimbel: Be present.

You have to be present.

You have to be in
the middle of it.

It's like chaos.

Chaos is interesting.

I have all these little terms.

Chaos is interesting,
fighting is interesting,

reality is interesting, much
more so than creating something,

creating, whatever that means,

but reality is really the
most interesting thing.

**

George is human in the true
sense of what humans should be.

The work that he's
done is very important.

He's part of that group of
people that actually gave birth

to what today we call humanist
photography, or reportage,

or storytelling.

He's the founder of the genre.

* [jazz]

**

Zimbel: The more you look
at that picture,

the more it gives
you the willies,

because you could never
do that picture again.

You could never get
that close unimpeded

to a political candidate, be it
in Canada or the United States.

You had access; they
weren't worried.

They weren't worried.

They didn't need
all this control.

That's a very modern
thing and I hate it.

I really hate it.

There is a big question about
whether a photographer

can do his or her work
now in an honest way

where there's cameras
in the subway,

there's cameras everywhere
recording everything you do,

and they're telling
you you can't take pictures

and record what people do.

It's insane.

It's a power thing, and it
means that

"we can do it, we
can photograph you,

but you can't
photograph the world".

[traffic sounds]

Nobody was threatened by the
thirty-five-millimetre camera.

I suspect they didn't even think
the pictures would come out.

You could move and you could
move in close to people,

and the worst that could
happen is you'd get a smile,

"What are you doing?"

"You know, I'm taking
your picture",

"Oh, that's nice".

[school bell rings]

George Zimbel came into the
world of photography

at a time in which the world,

looking back now,
seems innocent.

Magazines were in their heyday,

news magazines like Life,
and Look, and Post,

and what they published isn't
what we publish today.

They didn't tend
to go after people,

and documentary photography was
largely at its core sympathetic.

It was a liberal position.

Klein: The important thing that
George learned very early on

was that you really had
to not only understand

the meaning of photography,

but more important
your relationship to it.

And the regard for every single
image that George has ever taken

is so authentic that
you really, um...

feel that he's a part
of another period.

That was a period in America
when we were quite hopeful.

People knew they could get jobs,
which is not so true today,

and they believed that
they would earn more

as they went along,

and that their children would
do better than they would.

The G.I. Bill was
giving education,

and that time I think
shows up in his pictures.

Bardaji: You don't feel misery;

you don't feel that it's
the end of the world;

you don't feel that there's no
reason to live anymore;

it's the opposite.

* [lively flute]

And the picture of the Irish
Dancehall, it's only about that.

**

Zimbel: The Irish Dancehall in
the Bronx was taken at the bar.

It's the longest bar
in New York City,

two hundred and ten feet long.

It was part of a story on
second generation Americans,

and the Irish were the first
group that I photographed,

and it was like
being in Ireland,

as far as I was concerned.

Everybody had a brogue accent,

and there was this young man
sort of looking around.

It's hard to describe exactly
and I don't want to, actually.

See the picture.

You just look at the photograph
and you just feel good.

It's like piece of
music, you know.

I feel like I wish I was there.

That was your first
one in MoMA, right?

Amazing.

When I opened the letter
from MoMA,

I felt, "Wow, this is
absolutely incredible".

The fact that they acquired
it unanimously and...

Well, it was just a
wonderful moment.

Actually, I have a copy of
the cheque pinned to my wall,

not because it's a cheque,
but because it's from MoMA.

Oh yeah, here we are.

Now I have the negatives;
I have the light box,

and I have a marking crayon.

Now, what are we doing here?

My mind is not great.

We're doing... oh, Schwartz's.

You know, I normally
don't think in advance

of what I'm going to do,

how I'm going to
photograph something.

I know you're
supposed to do that,

but I like the surprise
of getting somewhere,

and then seeing
the possibilities,

and just doing it.

When did you take those shots?
During the winter?

No, last week.

After they announced that a
venture capital company

was interested in Schwartz's,

I noticed that the
crowds outside there

were so extraordinarily
large that I went home,

and I don't carry my
camera every day now,

so I went back
and got my camera,

and started working the line.

One, two, three,
four, five, six.

Oh my goodness,
look at the crowds.

There.

Woo, no, no, no.

Who is this?

Oh, beautiful figure.

Oh, somebody's
kissing somebody

right in the middle
of the frame.

That's really nice.

Good luck to you both.

George invited me up to his
apartment to see his etchings.

I mean, like that's
what I heard in my head,

because that was a
standard joke at that time.

When somebody invites you up to
see their etchings, you know,

you don't go if you're a nice
girl, but I thought, well,

he wanted me to see some of
his photographs, so I went.

It was really a first for
me that someone would say,

"This is what I want to show
you; this is a terrific picture;

look at this terrific picture",

and I wouldn't think, "Oh, he's
a...you know, he's very vain".

I didn't think that, and
so we started dating,

but his friend Sig was
going back to Texas,

and George was going along
because he had some assignments.

George: And by that time I
was madly in love with Elaine

and writing her letters all the
time, and she was sort of...

Then I got even worse and I
was calling her collect.

Calling me from
Texas, and Louisiana,

and wherever he was on the
road, he would call me collect.

Well, calling her collect with
the promise that I'd pay her

when I get paid
for my photographs.

There were lots of phone
calls and lots of letters

going back and forth,

and finally George proposed
marriage to me and I accepted.

I proposed from El Paso

and then went all the way back
across to New Orleans.

That's a long, long way.

Sixty-eight miles an
hour in a Volkswagen;

that was the fastest
you could go.

Put your foot on the
gas, drive all day long,

sixty-eight miles an hour.

* [baritone sax and
hand claps] *

**

When I arrived in New Orleans,
my editors had been fired.

No work on the table.

Then I get a phone call from
George, collect of course,

and he said, "Hold everything.

My editors just got fired; I
just got a call from my agent.

The assignments are cancelled.

Do you still want to come?"

I was like "Yeah".

Elaine thought...She thought
I had changed my mind,

[chuckling]

and while I'm waiting, my
agent Lynn said,

"You know, there's a new
magazine starting up.

They would like you to do
something on Bourbon Street

in New Orleans".

I said, "Oh yeah,
that would be great".

Aha. OK, now hold it for a
second. I'm just going to go in.

I never thought I'd live
to the 21st century, but I did.

OK, here.

Yeah, OK.

Europe...personalities.

**

Bourbon Street, where are you?

Oh, Bourbon Street, OK.

Bourbon Street.

Yes.

**

The photograph of
the woman at the bar,

it's an important picture in the
sense of just getting the feel

of a bar at that time.

There's so many different
elements to that picture:

the woman singer,
the woman alone,

the audience when you see them
in the background.

There's so much happening
in that picture,

and it's such a quiet picture,
but it's not quiet at all.

**

I didn't spend too long on it.

I was maybe three days
total on that project.

I'd shoot, and then I'd lock
myself in and develop the film,

and what happened was soon after
they got all the contact sheets,

Lynn sent me a
telegram or something.

She says, "They don't like
it; they don't want it.

They're giving you a
hundred-dollar kill fee

for the story.

That's that.

Sorry".

And now it's in a museum.

Yeah. Yeah, now it's
in a museum.

And you'd have to shift gears.

I got that disappointment,
but Elaine was arriving.

We got married. You carry
on; you do your life.

[Elaine sighs]

When I got my telephone bill for
a hundred twenty-six dollars,

by that time we were
already married,

so that's the life of
a freelance artist.

George: November 29th, 2000.

Dear Maggie, you get paid when
you write letters and I don't,

but sometimes I have to
come out of the darkroom

and tend to business
and ethical issues.

First I will deal with the
philosophical aspects

of this situation.

You always had a wonderful
photography staff,

so your true New York Times
archive is rich in content

and available for whatever
commercial exploitation

the Times feels is profitable.

You have paid these
people a salary.

Their negatives are undoubtedly
in a file somewhere

at the Times.

The freelance people
traditionally have worked

for the Times on a one-time
reproduction rights basis.

To quote a letter which
New York Times publisher

Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, Jr.
wrote to me last year, quote,

"times have changed", unquote,

but they have not
changed so much

that you can take my property
to sell for your profit.

If I rent a car from you,
I am just renting a car.

It doesn't give me the
right to sell the car

once I am finished
with the rental.

I don't know how many
freelance photographers

have contacted you, but
if the letter I received

is the response they get,

I am very sad that you have seen
fit to treat us in this matter.

I hope you give this
serious attention

because it is a serious matter.

Yours truly, George Zimbel.

Female voice:
December 6th, 2000.

Dear Mr. Zimbel, I am in receipt
of your November 29 letter.

I have conferred with my
clients and have determined

that there are no plans to sell
any photographs taken by you

and printed in the
New York Times.

I am hopeful that the foregoing
will satisfy your concerns.

Please feel free to contact
me if you have any questions.

Very truly yours,
Maggie R. Drucker.

* [eerie theme]

**

George: Yesterday, I talked to
friends about the seamier side

of the publishing business,

about signed contracts that
don't mean anything,

about agreements that
are flexible,

about bankruptcy
and resurrection.

We agreed that power
is the key to stealing

what is called
intellectual property.

It is the word "intellectual"
that makes it OK to steal.

It is not, after all, like
stealing from a bank or a house.

"Get real", they say,
"this is business.

We're only dealing with
words and pictures,

the stuff you love to produce.

You are an artist!"

**

Friends tell me that I am naïve,

but I do know that rape
is against the law.

Elaine: He was always
doing work on his own.

It was like being
a writer, in fact,

that you write a story
that you want to tell,

and you hope that
somebody will say,

"Oh yeah, we'll publish that."

And he was good
at finding things

like the Kennedy parades and
the Marilyn shoot, of course.

* Marilyn singing:
I couldn't aspire *

* to anything higher

* than to fill the desire
to make you my own *

* ba dum ba dum toot ba dum

George: The
photography community

was a hell of a lot more
collegial then than it is now.

I think there's a
lot of competition.

There's not as much work
around, maybe, but anyway,

so there I was at PIX as a
stringer, and George Karger,

who was a very influential
New York photographer,

he did a lot of Broadway shows,
George asked me if I wanted to

go photograph one of the most
famous movie stars in the world,

and I thought he was kidding
me so I said Mae West,

and he said, "No,
Marilyn Monroe".

I said, "Oh, yeah,
that would be great".

He says, "Here. Here's
my credentials".

Now, that's fantastic.

No assignment, nobody telling
me what to do, no deadline;

just go and take photographs.

**

I ended up shooting right
into the Klieg lights,

which are a wonderful
part of the photographs.

The quality of those negatives
was amazing, beautiful.

And so I was there, I did the
shoot, I developed the film,

I lived on 35th Street
and Second Avenue,

got home I guess four
o'clock in the morning,

got it all developed,
hung up the film.

Next day I cut the film,
put it in envelopes,

and there it sat
for...till 1976.

So we're talking about 1954

and I was working on
another assignment

so I just put the
negatives away,

and I didn't try to
get them published.

I don't know.

I'm not sure why, but I didn't.

Well, there were lots of
other photographers there.

George: It wasn't
really what I do.

I don't do celebrity.

And a lot of the younger kids
think I do celebrity pictures,

but I don't.

But now I look at this shoot,

and I think, yeah,
I'm very proud of it.

I think it was well done
and it was a story, too.

So like, one of my favourites
is Billy Wilder and her,

and Joe DiMaggio was
there, Walter Winchell,

the "Good evening
Mr. and Mrs. America,

this is Walter Winchell".

So I have the story.

It's so typical that George
also photographed

not just Marilyn the icon,
but Marilyn the person.

And in the picture that he
calls "The Serious Marilyn",

where the Marilyn who was so
desperate to be accepted

as a serious actress and as
somebody who had a craft

and knew what her craft was,

he gets a contemplative
moment of her.

There aren't many pictures
of her like that.

There are a few, but that's
consistent with his approach:

find that humanity in his
subject and then make it visible

in such a way that the rest
of us would connect with it.

**

The first time they
were exhibited,

that's when I really started
to feel what was there.

And now those pictures from
that shoot, I think they're in,

I don't know, nine or
ten museum collections.

So somebody loved them.

It's amazing how they did that.

The fan just took the
dress very gently and...

made it into a flower.

When you get to be my age,
a lot of people are gone,

and you think...

No, at first it's very bad,
and then you say,

"Oh, we come and we go.

That's the nature of things".

Just try not to go too fast.

**

**

**

This is the first day
of the rest of my life.

I'm eighty-three and slept a
little later this morning

just for fun.

Tomorrow I'll get serious about
the many prints I have to make.

After all, it'll be second
day of the rest of my life.

Elaine: He was afraid
to leave New York

because he was afraid he
would be out of touch;

he wouldn't be available;
he wouldn't be seen.

You had to be there, just when
they had an assignment ready,

you know.

He had this kind of
urgency about it,

but somehow or other I
convinced him that, you know,

there are trains, you can get
into New York every day

if you need to, and you know, we
need to have some space.

We were getting further
and further from New York.

We were called ex-urbanites.

And the last place we had
before we moved to Canada

actually was almost
twenty-some odd acres.

That was terrific.

Elaine: Being from a large
family, I always thought,

"Oh, I'm going to
have six kids".

You know how teenagers
talk about stuff like that,

and after I had my third son...

George: We decided it would be
better to adopt a child

than to have another child,

but it was really a very
difficult process

because I was on the road
a lot during that process

working on assignments,

and she's waiting at home for
a call from immigration.

Elaine: I always say it was
my most difficult pregnancy.

George: When our
daughter arrived

after a long plane flight
from Korea to New York,

she's the last child we had,
and the child of choice,

and she was greeted by
her brothers and by us.

Well, the father
was taking pictures.

I wasn't up close to give her
a hug right then and there.

Matt Zimbel: It must have
been so strange for her

to be on a flight that long,

and arrive, and then be
surrounded by all this love.

I remember we drove from New
York to back to where we lived

in Continental Village, and I
think she screamed the entire

hour-and-ten-minute
trip and bit my mother.

Things have improved.

**

George: I feel like I
never spent enough time

with my family.

Then they say, "Well,
what do you mean?

We would come by the lab after
we came home from school,

and you would talk to us,
and we'd all be there",

and I always felt,
"No, it wasn't enough".

Elaine: But when he was
there, he was there.

Matt: Absolutely present, yes.
He was very present.

You know, I don't recall
George shooting all the time.

I mean, it's not like we
always felt like we were on

or we had to be on as a family
because he was always shooting.

It never felt in any way
invasive, to my memory,

but to have those pictures
now, to go back and to...

It's almost like you go
back in those moments

and you can almost smell
it, or feel it, or...

You have a whole resurgence of
the emotions that you had

when you took them and it's
like...It's a cumulative thing.

It's a great feeling.

I don't think you can ever
separate the photographer

from the photographs.

That's very much a
personal statement

that they're coming
forward with.

And I think when you look
at all these photographs

that George has made,

then you're looking at George.

Tucker: Whether they were
contemplative, or joking around,

or working hard, or just
crossing the street,

George has a great eye
for revealing gestures.

Goldberg: I tend
to think he is more like

some of the French street
photographers of his time.

and he'd been in Europe.

I once said something
about his being an optimistic

photographer, and he said,
"I'm not a jolly person".

Well, maybe not, but
he's got a jolly eye.

Bulger: And that happiness
really permeates into the work

that he's showing and
what's interesting

is what he's choosing
to photograph

and what he's choosing
not to photograph.

Tucker: Photographers self-edit.

They self-edit on the street
when they're photographing;

they self-edit off
the contact sheet;

they self-edit after they've
made prints and live with them.

And within George's work, there
are threads that you can enjoy.

Humour is a big one.

There's the men who are joking
around and goosing each other.

Or there's the humour of the
big dog and the little boy.

It just makes you laugh.

Every time you see those
pictures they make you laugh.

I think he has always looked
for that human spark in people.

**

Even the children
playing on the street,

when George photographed it,

some of them were quite
scruffy and dirty,

but they were still
playing like children.

That wonderful sequence
with the box, for instance.

Tucker: I can almost see
him shaking his head

at these young people,

and it really feels
to me like an

adult-looking-at-kids picture.

Goldberg: [laughs]

His photographs of children
are quite remarkable,

including children who have
not had the best of lives

and may not have
the best of lives.

**

**

OK.

Qu'est-ce que c'est ça?

Wow.

Wow.

I found the picture.

Nothing to do with Schwartz's,
nothing to do with anything

except it's a picture.

Un, deux, trois,
quatre, cinq, six.

If you are looking at a negative
and you see something

that really jumps out at you
that's going to work,

it's very exciting.

I don't care how long
you've been photographing;

it's exciting.

And I found one among all
these that I'm doing now

that I think would answer
that, and one is fine.

I don't need ten,
and this is it.

It's right here if
you want to see it.

My shadow's in the foreground,
so I'm in the picture

with these two guys and I
don't know who they are,

and I am really curious
to see their expressions.

That, I can't see
with the glass.

But I'll see it soon
enough when I scan it.

George: The moment
is so important,

and the moment is what
makes photographic art

different from other arts.

There's nothing else like that.

One frame.

I must say that I call the
digital approach

"digital diarrhea".

What are you going to do
when you've been doing it

for twenty years and you have
twenty thousand, fifty thousand,

a hundred thousand images?

Are you going to find the image?

Maybe you will, maybe you won't.

Maybe your head will break open.

This is very primitive,
but it seems like it works,

and I'm primitive, so
that's a good combination.

OK, so this looks good.

Now, I'm going to do a
little bit of messing around.

Now, I didn't hurt
those two guys.

I think it's a lovely
picture of them,

and I think if they saw it
they'd probably be happy.

* [baritone sax
and hand claps] *

**

**

**

George has remained true to
that personal position in life,

has for six decades now.

Stayed with that
mission of the watcher,

but from a position
of delight.

**

Did you see that?

It says Ellenville,
New York there.

I don't think I'm
going to shoot that.

You can't shoot everything.

Hi, can I take a
picture of the dog?

You can come inside if you
want to take a picture.

Oh, OK.

I saw you.

I was here about four months
ago and I saw you guys.

There, there, that's a baby.
I miss my dog.

Knock it off.

He's OK.

So, what are you doing a barber
shop and Internet service,

trying to survive, right?

Yeah, I'm just chilling.

I know a lot of people, so...

Yeah, well you've
got to do that.

That's what you've
got to do these days.

Yes, so let's do it.

Wait a minute now.

OK, four, five feet.

Oh, that's going
to be excellent.

Now look at me, sir.

[shutter click]

Oh, OK.

I got it.

I'm a visually...
visually upbeat person.

I am a visually upbeat person

because I see things
that are sort of up

and it gets me
interested,

and I love to see
those things.

But in my mind I'm
not an upbeat person.

I'm sort of
disappointed in mankind,

and I'm disappointed
in politicians,

and I'm disappointed
in architecture,

and all those things.

And yet my visual thing
is not disappointed;

it's celebratory.

There. That looks nice.
That really looks nice.

[baby squawks]

I know how to do that. Ah.

You look like you
want to say something.

Talk.

It's your time.

I think that you're born with
an instinct to do things.

It could be anything; it
could be construction,

it could be photography,
it could be music.

I really feel that something -
it's not an intellectual thing -

connects and makes you do it,

keeps you interested
in doing it.

Look, I'm over eighty now,
and I've been doing, what,

sixty years?

I still find it
extremely interesting.

Oh, this is your storage room.
Look at this, Jean-Francois!

That's what I...I had one when I
was around thirteen or fourteen.

It was a very nice camera. Wow.

I must say that the whole idea
of photography was sort of there

all the time, because we
did get the New York Times.

My father had it every Sunday.

And that goes from
when I was little,

I would go up and get the paper,

and so you'd see
the Times magazine;

you'd see Life and Look.

They're all very present and
it was all very romantic.

And then I read about the

American Society of Magazine
Photographers.

Oh my God, it
sounded so exciting.

I said, you know, this is
what I would like to do.

And when I was fourteen,
I convinced my father,

and I really think he
was being very generous

now that I look back at it,

that I should get a Speed
Graphic camera four by five,

a real professional camera.

And I arranged with the local
newspaper to get me a priority

because the war was on
so you needed a priority.

And there it was, this beautiful
four by five speed graphic

war time model, all black.

And I didn't know what
the hell I was doing,

but I started
doing it anyway.

**

I was interested in sports

and so I travelled
with the football team

and would shoot the games.

And it was like a
game of my own

to see how many touchdown
plays I could get on film.

I only had eight shots.

That was it.

But anyway, I'd get
back from the game,

I rode on the bus with the team,
developed the film at night

because I didn't
have a darkroom,

and dried the film somehow
or other and print it.

And Sunday morning, I would
have brought the prints

up to the paper store

so that when people were coming
to get the paper on Sunday,

there would be pictures
of the football game.

It was like my first exhibition.

[car horns honking]

The first day that
I was at Columbia,

this guy knocked on
my door and he said,

"I understand that you're
interested in journalism".

I said, "How did you know that?"

He said, "Well, it was
on your application

and I'm on the managing board
of The Spectator.

It's a daily newspaper.

Would you like to work?"

And that was a revolution.

That changed my whole life.

Grossman: Working on the
Spectator was great fun

and very interesting.

It was also a very lively time.

McCarthy era was upon us.

There was a lot of
discussion about communism

and about subversives,

and about whether
communists should be allowed

to teach on campus.

Wow, look at this, Elaine.

I was a small town kid in
absolute awe

of all my student colleagues,
a lot of them from New York.

They were so smart
and they knew politics,

and they knew art, and
they knew everything!

And I felt like a rube,

but I did know photography,
and that was very important.

Grossman: Columbia had a couple
of very good photographers,

but George was the
prince of them all.

He would cover anything
and everything.

George: In 1949, I gave up my
cushy summer job at a camp

as a photographer

just to see how it would be to
be a freelancer in New York.

And when I decided to stay,

there was a camera salesman
at Peerless Camera,

his name was Lou Bernstein,
and Lou was an animator.

You would love to have him in
your organization, because Lou,

he had his finger on
everything that was happening

photographically in New York.

So when he heard that I was
going to stay, he said,

"Well, you have to go to the
Photo League and take a course".

**

That course was amazing to me.

That course gave me a feeling of
the value of a beautiful print,

which is still with me now.

**

In my book--

I'm going to call it Two
Guys, Montreal, 2012.--

I'm using Ilford Art 300
paper, warm tone developer.

I'm going to set the lens
at 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, f8,

and I'm going to guess
twenty-two seconds

with no filter and
I'll do a test.

John Ebstel was
a tough teacher.

He not only helped
me technically,

but one of the main things he
did was to clarify my mind.

When I brought in a
double print

of my current girlfriend and the
ocean overprinted onto it,

and he said, "What is that?"

And I said, "It's a picture
of my girlfriend", and he says,

"Well, is there something
wrong with her?"

And I said, "No, there's
nothing wrong with her.

I think she's beautiful".

He said, "Wouldn't it
be more interesting

just to show what
she looks like?"

So now we go to the soup.

And that was like...that
was a marker on my career.

You don't have to mess
around with reality

to get an interesting picture.

[buzzer]

OK. Now...reach up there.

It's way too light.
Way too light.

December 11, 2000.

Dear Maggie Drucker, when
I first read your letter,

I had a feeling that
it didn't say anything

that would address the
issues I raised with you.

So here I am again when I
should be in the darkroom.

First is the question of the
Jacqueline and John Kennedy

New York City 1960 print.

It is my property and I would
like to have it safely returned.

In regard to whatever prints of
mine may be in your archives,

I would like them
returned to me.

And in any event, I do not give
permission for them to be sold.

Thanks for your
attention to this matter.

My best regards, George Zimbel.

[traffic noise]

Female voice: December 20, 2000.

Dear Mr. Zimbel.

Let me explain why, in
addition to the fact

that there is no legal
basis for returning photos,

which we have discussed,

we can't comply.

That photo through the years has
become a historical document

by virtue of the Times'
possession of it.

The back of it has become
as important as the front

because it is a passport to
its life at our newspaper.

In fact, it is this
very documentation

that gives value to
the scuffed print.

As a photographer who has shot
extensively throughout his life,

I know you understand the
worth that the Times

brings to history.

And now your photograph
has become part of ours.

I hope you can
understand our position

and that we have
satisfied your concerns.

Very truly yours,
Maggie R. Drucker.

I really believe that I am a
documentary photographer

by nature in the sense that
I want to tell stories,

and then I would choose the
ones that I wanted in print,

whereas a photojournalist,
by nature,

they have to get the stuff out
and get it into circulation

because there's a demand.

That's amazing, isn't it?

'54, that's sixty years ago!

And these negatives
are beautiful.

These are beautiful.

Harry Truman always
fascinated me.

When I was in the army,
he was the president

and he wanted a
few changes made,

like integrating
the armed forces,

the black and white guys.

He wrote a presidential order.

It wasn't a big thing
going to Congress

and lots of fights from people;

he just did
it and it worked.

I had the utmost
respect for that man

and I decided that I wanted to
do a thing on what happens

when a president
retires from office.

So I started in 1954 shooting
photographs of Harry Truman

every time he came into New
York. And he was accessible.

He was friendly and
he was accessible.

And so the cab drivers of
course, knew he would be there.

And the ones that
wanted to talk to him

would come and talk to him.

And it was very casual,

but it was very important
for these guys.

And then one time I said, "Could
we get one more, Mr. Truman?"

and he says, "Hell, son, I'm
the president of the

'one more, Mr. President club".

And later on, I read that.

I read that in a
biography of Truman.

Actually, they called it the
One More, Mr. President Club.

**

**

It ended in 1964.

I happened to be on assignment
out in Missouri at that time

and I realized that it was
his eightieth birthday...

so I phoned up his library
and identified myself.

They said, "Oh
yes, please come".

I really believe that
people like Truman,

they had their heart
in the right place

and that they wanted to make
life better for people.

OK, here goes the light.

Let us all pray.

It's still too contrasty.

Columbia Camera
Club had a darkroom.

If you went around
six, seven o'clock at night,

it was always crowded.

So the solution was to go
over there around midnight

and work until daylight.

Garry Winogrand was
bouncing around at the time

and he would work and I would
work and then in the morning,

we usually would go over to the
Chock full o'Nuts

and have a coffee, and he'd
go home and go to sleep,

and I'd have to go to class.

Goldberg: I just think
Winogrand and Zimbel

had very different eyes.

They were both
remarkable photographers.

They both had remarkable eyes

and it would be very odd
if they looked the same.

Tucker: George was trying
to connect with people

and connect people through
his photographs.

Gary was pulling back literally

'cause of the wide angle that he
used and also physically.

I guess George is laughing with
us and Gary is laughing at us.

Zimbel: We really fought all
the time about images,

and it's a great learning thing.

You know, you realize that if
you can fight and defend

what you've done, then
you're grounded.

And we'd really give
it to each other.

[squawking geese]

Winogrand, and Feingersh
and I would go out for a walk,

and we used to look for a
telephone pole or anything

that was upright, and we'd
shoot a picture with the pole

in the middle to see what was
going on on both sides,

which could be very,
very interesting.

And I kept doing that. And we
used to have fights, of course.

You know, "Which side
do you like better?"

or "Why did you do that?"

I'm trying to block the sun.

There.

There.

I think that if you're
overconfident

or even self-confident, you're
not dealing with reality

in this business because
it has to do with things

you have no control over.

You're the one
that's going out

to look at them to record them,

but you're not running them.

When I was photographing the
Northfolk & Western Rail Road,

climbing up on coal piles
to get a better angle

or staying next to the
tracks as a train whizzed by

because you wanted to
get a particular feel.

All that stuff is
something you're doing

to get the
photograph you want,

but you have no
control over it.

And I have never felt
technically competent,

to be very honest with you.

Evidently I am, but I
don't feel that way.

This I talked about, parce-que
Elaine, we were just married,

OK, and she said,

"You know, there is a bunch
of guys there, right?"

Yes, yes, right,
right, right.

And this is the picture.
Aren't they beautiful?

Yes, yes, yes.
It's a nice girl.

This is famous. I
want to see it.

And it's interesting.

Look, this wonderful man,

he just happened to
come out his door.

I mean, they're bad
boys, like playing...

I love construction work.

I did a lot of work.

I did high steel.

Did you give them
a photo?

Yeah.

Le dernier soir, I said, "Oh my
God, what am I going to bring?"

Charbonneau:
It's all good, yeah.

So basically, I think
I had seen these two.

This I hadn't seen, this...

When Elaine and I moved to
Putnam County, New York,

which is sixty miles
out of New York City,

we were doing a lot of things
for the New York Times

travel section with the kids;

everybody would go together
and we'd have an adventure

and I'd photograph it and
she would write about it.

**

Elaine: Many times, the stories
that we ended up doing

were just a result of
a Sunday drive.

We would get in the car
not even thinking about

writing a story or photographing
a story or making a living.

**

Storm King Mountain
was a Sunday drive.

We loved adventures like that
and we saw all these remains

of homes that were burned to
the ground or something.

And it was strange because
the forestry wasn't burned;

it was just the houses
and we were so puzzled.

What happened? What happened?

It looked like a tragedy and
we found out that Con Edison,

the electric company was going
to build a pump storage

hydroelectric plant on that
historic, beautiful site.

It took a long time.

The battle went on
for many, many years.

I wasn't the only one who
decided to write about that.

I mean, there were
groups in New York then

that got on the bandwagon
and were very, very vocal.

And this is the first time
that such an approval

had ever, ever, ever, ever been
reversed, and that was historic.

I don't want to start crying.

Matt: My parents were
always for justice.

They were always fighters for
what they believed was right,

so when my father found out that
one of his pictures was being

sold without authorization
by the New York Times,

it became a very pitched and
intellectual battle of rights

with an institution that my
father has had a long

and adoring relationship with.

So for him there was a huge
stake in the whole matter,

but notwithstanding, he
wasn't going to allow them

to take property that
they did not own.

**

January 3rd, 2001.

Dear Maggie.

What an eloquent letter.

Please fax or email me the front
and back of my Kennedy picture,

which was offered
for sale in Paris.

I know it was not made
for the New York Times,

and I want to know
its provenance.

My best regards,
George S. Zimbel.

January 12, 2001.
Dear Mr. Zimbel.

Pursuant to your
January 3, 2001 request,

I have enclosed a copy
of the front and back

of the Kennedy photograph.

Please feel free to contact me
with any further questions

or concerns.

Very truly yours,
Maggie R. Drucker.

George: OK, here we go.

January 16, 2001.

Dear Maggie.

The provenance has
now become clear.

The print was requested
by your photo editor.

It evidently was used by
your women's page and was not

returned to me after use,
as is the normal procedure.

It was not shot for
the New York Times.

It was done for my ongoing
personal documentary project

on American politics.

I am getting very
upset as I write this.

Dear Mr. Zimbel.

I was pleased to hear that the
issue of your Kennedy photograph

has been resolved and that the
print is being returned to you.

As I think Jim Monas, director
of the New York Times

photo archive has
made clear to you,

our return of the
photograph does not suggest

that we do not stand by
our legal position.

We continue to believe in
our ownership of the print,

but in the spirit
of compromise,

we have agreed to make an
exception in this case.

Dear Maggie Drucker.

Jim Monas used terms such
as "valued contributor"

and "long-time relationship" and
then added the proviso

that I would have to pay fifty
percent to the New York Times

if I sold it.

I used several expletives to
let him know that the photograph

belonged to me and I expected
it returned properly packed.

He urged me not to get excited

and said he would call
me the following day.

He did, stating that the
photograph would be returned

with no proviso.

So after thirty-nine years,

the print was where it
was supposed to be.

It is and always has
been, my property.

I am not an exception.

I am one of those freelance
people who you seem intent

on denigrating in the
name of increased profits

for the New York
Times company.

It is not acceptable.

You used your muscle and words

in a court of law
because you're lawyers.

I will use my muscle and words
in the court of public opinion

because I am a communicator.

Yours truly, George S. Zimbel.

Mason: I just have always
admired this intensity

and humility that...and
respect for what he does.

George, thank you for coming
out on a day like today.

Normally I would stay home.

George buys film, buys
developer and fixers,

and he shoots practically
on a daily basis.

See you soon, George.

And he's making photographs
as important today

as those photographs that he
made fifty years ago.

**

**

Elaine: One summer night,

the barn where he had his
photography was on fire.

Somebody lit it.

And when we got home,
the fire was out

but the building was gone.

It's a tragedy because
first of all, my friends,

I was a volunteer fireman.

That was my public
service thing,

and so the guys knew
where my negatives were

and I had told them if
anything ever happens here,

save the negatives,
save the negatives.

And some of them risked their
lives to go into the fire

and get out what they could,
so they did save some stuff.

But the loss, I'm the kind of
person if I have a bad happening

like that, I'll go right back
to work and just get into it.

And I shouldn't have done
that because it was terrible.

Over the years I keep
saying, "Oh, where is that?

Where is that?"

And then I realize
it went up in flames.

**

**

Bulger: When you look at
the work that he was doing

in New York York in the late
sixties and early seventies,

I think at one point George
had almost given up

on American society...

mean streets of New York that
had become very dark places.

**

Within a very short
couple of years

of taking those photographs,

he left the United States
to find a better place

for him and his family
in Prince Edward Island.

And when I see those photographs
I think that, you know,

that must have been reflecting
his state of mind at the time,

that he was trying really hard
to concentrate on the good and,

you know, what's possible,
and what's achievable.

But I think by
the late sixties,

he had realized that it was
just not going to happen

the way that he was hoping.

**

Well, my wife and I,
we have four children...

and we saw the direction

that the world was getting
more and more commercialized.

I was really pissed off
about the Vietnam war.

Remember, I'm an ex-soldier;
I was in the US Army,

so I was politically very upset.

How we ended up with the
farm, I mean, we had the land

and we loved the ocean
which was right nearby.

It was quite beautiful.

But I think we were
in tune with that.

It was crazy. Everybody
said we were crazy.

"You're going to start a farm?

You don't even
know how to farm".

Yes, that was true, but people
helped us and we farmed.

Elaine: It was a big change
of lifestyle for everyone.

[cow moos]

That's where the fun began,
because everybody said,

"you came from New York and you
moved to Prince Edward Island?

Are you crazy?"

New York, Prince Edward.

What's the difference?

They're both islands.

George: And then the word
started to get around.

"Well, maybe he was a
drunkard or something.

Maybe he had troubles
back in the States

and he had to get out" or all
those little stories, you know.

We had ten good years there.

I learned how to drive a
tractor and milk a cow,

which I said I never would do.

I milked a cow for
nine and half years.

That's a lot of milk and then
just in the last two years

I was at a museum in Florida
and the curator said to me,

"Do you mean to say you left
the United States in 1971,

just as the art market for
photography was ballooning?"

and I said, "Yeah, that's
sort of stupid, isn't it?"

and he says, "Yeah".

* [baritone sax and
hand claps] *

When we decided to move back
to an urban environment,

we could have gone anywhere.

And there was only one
place we wanted to go

and that was Montreal.

I remember in '67 when they had
the World Fair, I met a woman,

she was an architect,
and she said,

"Montreal is the
artistic soul of Canada",

and I never forgot that.

When we moved here and
I started to show work,

people got excited about it;
they were interested in it.

It was a buzz happening.

And the connection I
made with Gallery Art45

and Serge Vaisman
was incredible.

**

I learned about exhibitions,
and how to show,

and how to prepare
work and I said,

"This is what I want to do".

My wife keeps telling me,
"You never had a job".

I've always been freelance,
and I like it that way.

All this is choisi.OK.

I value the freelance life,
and as long as I have music,

and my studio and my
darkroom, that's OK,

as far as I'm concerned.

**

[laugh]

All right, so there we go.

Yeah, I rather like that.

That's the dancing hands.

That wall didn't want
to come in, you know.

It did not want to come in.

C'est beau, George!

The key is dancing hands.

When you're in the darkroom
in front of an enlarger,

your hands have to dance,
because you have to know

how to get the texture -
texture, texture, texture

is so important out of
everything in your photograph.

OK, we're almost ready
to say hallelujah.

Ready?

Hallelujah.

Well, hallelujah!

OK, so there you go and then
into the developer she goes.

OK.

Oh, man.

It seems like it's
coming up beautifully,

but you will have to tell me.

The world will have to tell
me if it is really beautiful.

I don't know. We'll see.

[buzzer]

I think that works.

OK.

Bulger: With printers like
George, they'll go through,

you know, a day or two days
working on a new negative

until it achieves what
they previsualize.

So to finally get a
print to that stage

is a real labour of love,
and it's something that is

necessary for the
photographer to do

because someone else
might see something else

as being the centre
area of interest

and that way, then, as the
viewer, you're not sure

what the interpretation
is you're looking at.

Like, is this what the
photographer intended,

or is this what the printer did?

And is it a good printer
or is it a bad printer?

George: So the early ones will
be glossy-matte-dried

and the later ones
would be uh, matte.

The picture is the print and to
get more sophisticated about it,

one of my photo
dealers said to me,

"What I do is I sell prints.

I don't sell your
photographs; I sell prints".

This is my favourite.

Yeah.

We talked about this one before.

Bulger: Photography used
to be like a classic trade

where you would work
with the materials,

learn how to use them,

and just spend the
rest of your life

getting better and
better and better at it.

Whereas, photographers certainly
in the last twenty years,

you're probably on camera
number fifteen right now

if you're a professional.

Whereas, if you had a
Leica in the fifties,

as long as it's
been maintained,

you're still using that same
Leica and the same lenses.

George: Oh, isn't that
beautiful!

Oh, well, I didn't look.

It's easier when you
use the viewfinder.

And then when it
starts to do red...

Everything that is...

When it starts to do red,
you know you're there,

so you can shoot right away,
even if you can't see what the

Hell you're doing.

Exactly.

It's very handy when
something is far away.

It's like...It's
sort of like a toy.

It's not a toy, but it feels...

In a way I feel sorry for
the photographers now.

There's so much
choice in terms of

how they're going
to do things.

There are so many decisions
that they have to make

about their look.

The look is hyper realistic.

You don't see that way; you see
more like the Leica lenses

and the earlier lenses.

You see roundness
in people, you see,

I don't know...I guess
they call it plasticity.

Now, you see detail, detail,
detail and you know what?

The detail gets to
be...get in the way.

**

**

Tucker: Young people who
enter the world through...

electronically, digital
cameras, digital printers,

digital transmission,

it's rarely about subtlety.

It's about a kind of personal
vision that is very alien

to the universal ties that
George was trying to get at...

this presumption that there are
things about all of us

that can connect us by
appealing to our sameness.

**

George: You know what? You
have to have a great eye.

That's what you're born with
or maybe you develop it,

but if you don't
have a great eye,

I don't give a damn
what camera you use

or what anything you use; you
have to have a great eye.

**

**

As a documentary photographer
in the age of cyber Hell,

I face the problem of
going forward or backwards,

of being with it or out of it.

I have good negatives
from the past,

and may go into the
darkroom to make prints,

or I can sit at a desk and
scan them into a computer,

thereby entering the era of
digital romanticization

that transforms what is
into what isn't.

It's a choice.

I think I'd rather
stay in the dark.

**

**

Why are you shooting the
pictures in the first place?

If you really think about
it, as far as I'm concerned,

I'm shooting because I want
people to share the experience.

I'm not bragging about it; I
want them to see what I've seen

and to soak it in.

For me, that's what art
photography is about.

Here in Montreal, I was in a
coffee shop and this guy came up

to me and said, "I hear you're
a photographer" and I said,

"Yeah" and he said, "So am I".

So I showed him some
stuff, and he said,

"You know, I live in Spain and I
think there's a museum there

that would be really
interested in your work".

Naïve I am, I started
getting photocopies made,

and I wrote a note saying, "I
was told you might be interested

in this work and here it is".

And a while after that I got a
note saying that they were very

interested in the work and
they were considering

doing a retrospective
exhibition.

I couldn't believe it.
I couldn't believe it.

And it was signed by a
fellow named Josep Monzo

and he said he was
coming over to Montreal.

**

I think it took three years
to put it all together,

and I'm very pleased.

It was a night to remember.

**

Bulger: I think that George has
in some way allowed himself

to arrive at an equilibrium
and yet it's so wonderful

to think that within
the last ten years

he's been internationally
recognized.

Who deserves it more?

[applause]

Bulger: As much as his
photographs celebrate life,

they also celebrate photography.

And I think that if you
are embracing photography

as a medium,

it's impossible not to
embrace George's photographs

because they're very much
about the medium itself.

**

You can take a photo at
a hundredth of a second,

but it takes longer to read it.

Then the fun begins.

Reading a photograph is
more like taking a trip;

you see things that kindle all
kinds of memories, good and bad.

Your life is the reference.

Move down, move down some
more, some more, some more.

And I can tell you since I've
been shooting since I was

fourteen years old, it
really is about memory.

Everybody's looking at me?

You all look: "Ah! Wonderful!"

OK, here we go again.

He's been all his life focused
on photography, on his work.

That has always been a very
primary things in his life.

George: Street photography.

Now somebody
could call the police on you

if you're taking a picture.

If they say they're
going to put me in jail

because I'm taking somebody's
pictures with no evil intent,

then let them put me in jail.

I'm not going to stop,
because it's history.

It's very important to be
able to record daily life.

That's the most interesting
thing, not celebrities.

Every week I come home and
say, "Oh, guess what I saw?

Guess what I saw?"

I don't need a camera
to shoot photographs.

I shoot photographs
whether I have a camera

or I don't have a camera.

They're just as enriching to
me, 'cause they're in my mind.

Is it hard for you
to shut it off?

Impossible.

* [baritone sax and
hand claps] *