Item #40978 Two b/w photographs of the gigantic Camel Cigarettes billboard in Times Square, New York, c. 1965. William S. BURROUGHS.
Two b/w photographs of the gigantic Camel Cigarettes billboard in Times Square, New York, c. 1965.
Two b/w photographs of the gigantic Camel Cigarettes billboard in Times Square, New York, c. 1965.
Two b/w photographs of the gigantic Camel Cigarettes billboard in Times Square, New York, c. 1965.
Two b/w photographs of the gigantic Camel Cigarettes billboard in Times Square, New York, c. 1965.
Two b/w photographs of the gigantic Camel Cigarettes billboard in Times Square, New York, c. 1965.

70.

Two b/w photographs of the gigantic Camel Cigarettes billboard in Times Square, New York, c. 1965.

Vintage deckle edge silver gelatin prints. Each 7x9.7cm.

Both photographs (seemingly identical at first glance) were taken by Burroughs just as the Camel man exhaled, sending out a huge air ring of smoke (actually steam), which occurred every few seconds. The billboard, with its famous advertising slogan “I’d walk a mile for a Camel”, was created in 1941 and subsequently featured a soldier, an airman, a movie star, an athlete, and, as here, a man dressed in a Brooks Brothers suit and trilby hat, looking not unlike Burroughs himself. Brief clips of the billboard were included by Antony Balch in his short film, “The Cut-Ups” (1966).

Visible below is Hector’s Cafeteria, mentioned by Jack Kerouac on the opening page of “On the Road” when Dean Moriarty first arrives in New York and “looking for a place to eat… went right to Hector’s, and since then Hector’s Cafeteria has always been a big symbol of New York for Dean.”

The second of the two photographs is illustrated in Taking Shots: The Photography of William Burroughs (p.36).

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