I’ll admit it.  I get star struck.  Without getting too hoity-toity, I’ve had the chance to meet some well known people.  Well, not now, but in a previous life I got to meet them and seeing them up close I was struck by how normal some of them were.  Then others I was really impressed by.  But very rarely did I get honest to god star struck.

This past Sunday, I had a real star struck sort of a moment.  I got to see and briefly speak with this man:

Were you expecting a movie star?  Well this is a movie star in my world.  His name is Bill Cunningham and he has been the Style page photographer for the New York Times for the past 40 or so years.

Bill Cunningham’s stock in trade is photographing the look and style of people, not necessary famous people, just people. Frequently in the New York Times there are bunch of photos of puffy coats and ballerina slippers and I think to myself “I need to start wearing puffy coats and ballerina slippers.”  The man has an eye for style, that is very true.  Which is why I was extremely glad that I wore a lovely dress to the festivities and not shorts.  However, Mr Cunningham chose not to take my photo, but as is usually the case, I was more interested taking his photo than I was in him taking mine.  Of course I was checking out his camera as well.

Honestly, I was afraid of taking this man’s photograph.  And I’m not usually timid when I am safely behind the lens.  I usually pretend like I didn’t even take the photo.  I did get a few good ones off, I think:

It was funny because I was initially very star struck and kept saying to myself “there’s Bill Cunningham, there’s Bill Cunningham.” And then I wanted to photograph the band leader for the shindig (more on him in an upcoming entry) and I said to myself “hey Bill Cunningham, don’t step into my photo.”  But he’s Bill Cunningham, he can do what he wants.

And I did get him doing what he obviously loves to do the best:

Documenting.