Pin-up photographer Bunny Yeager dies at 85
Pin-up photographer Bunny Yeager dies at 85
By JENNIFER KAY and SUZETTE LABOY, Associated Press
Updated 10:04 am, Monday, May 26, 2014
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Miami Sports Queen Bunny Yeager poses by a pool on Miami Beach, Fla., in 1950. (Photo by Transcendental Graphics/Getty)
Miami Sports Queen Bunny Yeager poses by a pool on Miami Beach, Fla., in 1950. (Photo by Transcendental Graphics/Getty)
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Miami Sports Queen Bunny Yeager poses by a pool on Miami Beach, Fla., in 1950. (Photo by Transcendental Graphics/Getty)
FILE - In this 1960 file photo originally released by Bunny Yeager, Yeager poses for a self portrait in Naples, Fla. Yeager, a model turned photographer most famous for photographing Bettie Page in the 1950s, died Saturday, May 24, 2014, at a Delray Beach, Fla., hospice. She was 85 years old.
In this Tuesday, April 23, 2013 photo, photographer Bunny Yeager is shown at the Bunny Yeager Studio in Miami. Yeager was a model who become a pin-up photographer in the 50’s and 60’s. Behind her is a photograph showing Yeager photographing the then unknown Bettie Page with a cheetah in 1954.
Bettie Page in 1954 (Photo by Bunny Yeager/Paul Popper/Popperfoto/Getty)
In this photo taken in 1954 by photographer Bunny Yeager, model Bettie Page poses on a merry-go-round at an amusement park in Miami. Yeager was a model who become a pin-up photographer in the 50’s and 60’s.
Bettie Page in 1954 (Photo by Bunny Yeager/Paul Popper/Popperfoto/Getty)
Bettie Page in 1954 (Photo by Bunny Yeager/Paul Popper/Popperfoto/Getty)
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Model, pin-up photographer returns to spotlight
MIAMI BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Bunny Yeager, a model turned pin-up photographer who helped jump-start the career of then-unknown Bettie Page, died Sunday, her agent said. She was 85 years old.
Yeager died at a North Miami hospice where she had been for about a week, her agent, Ed Christin said.
Yeager’s legacy is her cultural impact, from pin-up photography and fashion, helping to popularize the bikini, and influencing other artists such as Cindy Sherman, who read Yeager’s guides on photographing nudes and making self-portraits, Christin said.
“Anyone in Miami in the 1950s who wanted a bikini would come to her, and she’d make one,” he said.
Yeager became famous for making everyday women, from stay-at-home mothers to airline attendants, feel comfortable enough to bare it all. Her photos of Page in a leopard-print bathing suit standing next to a real cheetah are still well-known today.
“They all wanted to model for me because they knew that I wouldn’t take advantage of them,” Yeager told The Associated Press during a 2013 interview. “And I wouldn’t push them to do nude if they didn’t want to do nudes. It wasn’t a day when nude photography was prevalent.”