Another dollop from the seemingly inexhaustible well of Beatlemania has arrived at the
deYoung Museum in San Francisco for the next four months.
In 2020 Paul McCartney rediscovered old pictures he had taken as an amateur art photographer for three months that spanned December 1963 through February 1964.
The settings are Liverpool, Paris, New York, and Miami just when their international fame was exploding, much of which was featured in the 1964 Richard Lester movie
A Hard Day's Night.
The photos are often prankish...
...when the quartet were in their early 20s.
It is also a reminder of the delicate beauty of John Lennon at that age.
There is a brief video of their epochal appearance on the weird old variety show hosted by Ed Sullivan...
...complete with shots of the screaming adolescent girls in the audience, a bizarre 20th century version of Euripedes's
The Bacchae.
The exhibit is aptly titled "Eyes of the Storm" as the observed watch the observers...
...including mobs of fans rushing down a New York street.
The most poignant character among the photos is Brian Epstein, their closeted homosexual manager who died at age 32 in 1967 after getting sloppy with too many strong pills and liquor a la
Valley of the Dolls.
The only color photos are from a Miami resort where they taped another appearance for the
Ed Sullivan Show.
If you have a membership to the Fine Arts Museum, the exhibit is well worth a visit. Otherwise, the hefty single ticket price is probably not worth it unless you are a Beatlemaniac yourself.
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