Richard Press

I grew up in New York, so I grew up reading the Sunday Times. It's always something I've been aware of, since my childhood.

childhood sunday reading

I always have admired what Bill Cunningham does, his body of work. I think it's a really important, seminal body of work. I think Bill celebrates creativity and self-expression. So it's really a lot of different kind of threads, all through the lens of Bill Cunningham.

creativity important thinking

I knew Bill Cunninghamn personally, in the way that most people know him - you don't really know that much about him. So I had never been in his apartment, as most people hadn't. I really had no idea how he lived. I knew he lived in Carnegie Hall, but that was it, and I didn't really understand. I knew that he worked hard, I just didn't realize that that was what he does, that's basically all he does

carnegie realizing people

I first started making films - this is my first feature, but I was making shorts - I was actually freelancing as a day job at The New York Times as an art director. I actually worked with Bill Cunningham and really soon after I met him, I thought, "Oh my God, he's a perfect subject for a documentary."

film perfect art

I don't think any other city actually has anyone who has actually documented the way they have lived or documented the city themselves. If you want to look at New York in the last half of the 20th century, into the 21st, you would look at Bill Cunningham's archives.

20th-century thinking

I think this kind of bohemianism doesn't really exist in the New York city anymore - the bohemianism that I was trying to record in Carnegie Hall that completely defined our culture. The people who lived and worked in Carnegie Hall studios, they defined our culture in music, dance, theater, fashion, illustration. It wasn't so much nostalgic as a celebration of that and an acknowledgment of that and saying that it's really important. And it's actually something that is a loss for the city, I think.

fashion loss thinking