Quote / Weegee/ text by John Coplans

The element of journalism in Weegee, as I said, mixes with his expressionist intent. The ere are number of journalistic photographers who are equally involved in the critical moment, simplifying the image to make it more telling. I could be that with Weegee, we are not really dealing with a photojournalist at all, but one who instead used photojournalism as a cover, unconciously or not. There is a large and recognizable sector of his work in which Weegee is not a detached reportorial professional. Weegee was aware of his whole enterprise as being surreptitious and contraband. This gave him a thrill. Thus, there is a contradiction in his apparent nerveless willingness to look upon appalling scenes and drink in passively , without any apparent tremor. In one sense his images were no less or more than ghoulish still-lifes to him, but on the other hand, it was his very insistence on focusing on these lurid moments forhis personal satisfaction which gives them their exceptional resonance. Finally , our awareness of Weegee's excitement promotes these images of ostensibly banal horror to a level of artistic horror which is capable of moving us. Weegee does not apologize. This private eye had a vital insensitivity that is precious. This is his fascination.

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Sometimes his presence at the scene of a photograph became an active element in introducing a grotesquely humorous touch, as in the picture of a drowned man at Coney Island, in which we see serried ranks of hypnotized spectators watching an ambulance team, headed by a doctor, attemption to resuscitate the swimmer. Kneeling at the side of the supine figure is a pretty companion, his wife or girl friend, clad in a swimsuit. It is a moment of high drama. Is the man dead or alive ? Yet, at the very moment Weegee takes his phtographs of the scene, the woman turns and flashes a coquettish smile at the camera. Let us admit that this could well be an accident- but not the insipid bad taste, or rather, the human knowledge that wanted it published.

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