Weegee: Society of the Spectacle - Hardcover

Chéroux, Clément; Young, Cynthia; Bonnet, Isabelle; Campany, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0500029121 ISBN 13: 9780500029121

Publisher: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 2025

Synopsis

Offering a new perspective on Weegee’s oeuvre, Society of the Spectacle presents the photographer’s iconic images alongside lesser-known works.

Weegee’s macabre tabloid photographs of murdered gangsters, bodies trapped in crashed cars, slums consumed by fire, and other poignant records of New York’s nocturnal low life in the 1930s and 40s are the stuff of legend. Lesser-known, however, is the work he created in his later years, when he satirized Hollywood, mocking its fleeting glory, jubilant crowds, and social scenes, and created celebrity portraits that he delighted in distorting using a palette of technical tricks. And herein lies the paradox of Weegee: how can two such wildly different bodies of work co-exist?

Offering the first evaluation of the famed photographer’s career in its entirety, this book reconciles the two sides of Weegee by showing how the ‘spectacle’ was the unifying theme of his work. Over 130 images, some iconic, some more rarely seen, are accompanied by essays that explore the consistent themes throughout Weegee’s career, his documentary and photojournalism work, and his last great series taken on the set of Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 film Dr. Strangelove.

About this title

About the Author

Clément Chéroux is a French photography historian and curator. He was recently named director of the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson in Paris; he was previously chief curator of Photography at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

From the Back Cover

Offering a new perspective on Weegee’s oeuvre, The Society of the Spectacle presents the photographer’s iconic images beside lesser-known works.

There’s a mystery to Weegee. The American photographer’s career seems to be split in two. One side includes his sensational photography printed in North American tabloids: corpses of gangsters lying in pools of their own blood, bodies trapped in battered vehicles, kingpins looking sinister behind the bars of prison wagons, dilapidated slums consumed by fire, an

Edition details

• Publisher: Thames and Hudson Ltd
• Publication date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0500029121
• ISBN 13: 9780500029121
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208