inside one of her iconic wearable sculptures that she called ‘penetrables,’ which were more so instruments for social action and revolution, like the student uprisings in France in May 68, for which she created a number of wearable protest banners. #julianwasser #sharontate #1960s #manson #photographer Kennedy was dead and the country was ready to break out of its cocoon of warm conformity. A disciple of Weegee, a zeigeistian zelig of a previous era, Wasser captured the cultural boom and bust of a post-war America burning with a dark desire: music, arts, crime, revolution. It wasn’t Wasser’s best work, but it was a significant turning point in American history and Wasser always had his blinkers on. He wanted to send the photos to a psychic because at this point the police hasn’t pinpointed Manson as the culprit. When he arrived, Roman was cleaning the word PIG off his front door, written with his wife’s blood. He told us about the time Roman Polanski called him the morning after Manson’s followers murdered his pregnant wife and her friends at his home on Cielo Drive. If Didion’s Slouching Toward Bethlehem was a written chronicle of the 1960s, Wasser’s was entirely photographic. We were introduced to Julian a few years back and met him at Jones Hollywood. Just learned from that the legendary photographer Julian Wasser has passed away at 85.

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