Latest news with #MorrisonSmileBig

Boston Globe

Photographically, California in the ‘60s comes to Hyannis in 2025

Ryan, 88, lives in Southern California. He grew up in Newton, studied photography with Minor White, W. Eugene Smith, and Ansel Adams. A job at Ski Magazine made him a professional photographer. That's how the Kennedy connection came about. Paul G. Ryan, "Morrison Smile Big," 1968. Paul G. Ryan In 1966, the magazine sent Ryan to spend a day photographing Robert Kennedy and his family skiing at Sun Valley, in Idaho. There are several of those pictures in the show — as well as one of Ethel Kennedy, from 1998, with her grandchildren. That's one of two color photographs. The predominance of black-and-white also makes sense. Yes, people associate the '60s with a tie-dyed, psychedelic, Day-Glo palette. Uh, groovy, man. But visually — in newspapers and on television at a time when color sets were still very much a luxury — the decade was seen in black-and-white. Advertisement It was also a decade that formalized informality: unbuttoning the culture, loosening things up, letting it all hang out. Many of the photographs nicely convey this. Less directly, so does how the show is displayed. Neither framed nor matted, the photographs hang from clips. Extensive wall texts offer both context and a winning sense of Ryan's character and personal history. Advertisement Paul G. Ryan, "Byron Black, Ensenada Beach, Mexico," 1966. Paul G. Ryan For a canonically '60s image, it's hard to top 'Daria on Paul's VW at Sea Ranch,' with its sense of casual experimentation and ad hoc community. For a canonically '60s title, it's hard to top 'Woman in Tree.' Look (very) closely and you can see a black-clad Jim Morrison in the background. The show has two photographs of Morrison, from the same day in 1968. Ryan got them because he noticed a crowd as he was driving past the San Jose Fairgrounds and heard music. It was the Doors. He wandered over and started taking pictures. Two years before that, he was arrested by Mexican police for 'taking pictures of the bad part' of Ensenada. 'I thought it was an interesting part of town,' Ryan writes. Police and photographers tend to see the world differently. That was especially true in the '60s. Paul G. Ryan, "Thelonious Monk and Dizzy Gillespie," 1963. Paul G. Ryan Along with Bobby and Ethel, Morrison is one of several famous people seen here. Some are very '60s: the civil rights activist Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture), the novelist Ken Kesey. There are '60s progenitors: the poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti, the novelist Henry Miller. An antiwar leader, Byron Black, isn't famous, but seeing him giving the peace sign as he sits cross-legged and naked, is echt-'60s. Plus, he's a dead ringer for The jazz musicians Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonious Monk aren't '60s figures — even if Monk's last great album Advertisement Paul G. Ryan, "Wolfman Jack," 1972. Paul G. Ryan The show is as much about where as who, and that where is largely the Bay Area and environs. It was such a constellation of '60s hot spots it was practically its own ZIP code (ZIP codes were introduced in 1963). Ryan photographed Berkeley; Golden Gate Park, in San Francisco (yes, he was there for the There are two other Bay Area communities in the show, San Rafael and Petaluma, but they're not seen in that guise. Ryan served as stills photographer on George Lucas's 'American Graffiti,' which was filmed in those towns. A half dozen photos are in the show. We get glimpses of Harrison Ford, Ron Howard, Cindy Williams, Richard Dreyfus, Wolfman Jack, and, best of all, Mel's Drive-in (shot in San Francisco). Paul G. Ryan, "Mel's Drive-in," 1972. Paul G. Ryan Taken in 1972, the stills are a good way to end the show. They announce Ryan's new career, in film, as photographer, camera operator, and cinematographer. Credits include 'Gimme Shelter,' 'Days of Heaven,' 'Batman Returns,' and 'A River Runs Through It.' They also circle back to the '60s. 'Where were you in '62?' asked the tagline for 'American Graffiti.' That year was the '60s, too, if a very different version from the one otherwise seen here. PAUL G. RYAN'S 1960s Advertisement At John F. Kennedy Hyannis Museum, 397 Main St., Hyannis, through Oct. 31, 508-790-3077, Mark Feeney can be reached at