What a pleasure to see these! There's nothing to compete with a dramatic look of well exposed black and white film photographs. And a red contrast filter...
New York is a city built on immigrants, and so it is no accident that many of our finest photographers have come to their subject as outsiders ready to see the City afresh.
It may be, when we think it is dead and has no more to say, it is time to leave.
Or, real estate, greed, and Trump may have finally succeeded and killed it. For now at least.
As Robert Frank advised: "Don't blink."
3
The beautiful faces and photographs of RFK, MLK, and Ali brought tears to my eyes! Real American GREATS and as I lived in NYC and was born there it is especially painful right now to see their greatness boldly, smiles and a hand outreached in love and brotherhood in the image of Robert Kennedy.
Oh, how my heart aches! This pain also lights the path to keeping hope alive. All it takes is a few great men to show us with way.
6
Ringling Brothers brought the elephants in to the Garden through the Queens Midtown Tunnel every year. The circus train was a mile long and couldn't enter Manhattan. And the elephants couldn't come up through Grand Central! So they walked them from Sunnyside Yards in a little hidden NY spectacle that real NYers would come out to see.
Not a transit strike and not the Holland Tunnnel.
4
The don’t make decades like they used to..
6
Yes, we are New Yorkers. But our city is dead.
11
Great photos. Brought me back to the times. And for about 15 minutes I was back there - reminiscing in my mind - and a world away from the new age that Donald Trump hath wrought. Oh well.
6
The adults see mess and chores; the kids see adventures.
5
I used to teach. At a private high school in Philadelphia.
AND--
--I had no high opinion of photographers and photography. You hold up your camera (I reasoned)--line up your subject--and snap. There's your picture.
Fool that I was!
My first year--Christmas of 2001 (a few months after 9/11)--we had a party. The yearbook advisor--an English teacher about ten years older than me--came up to me while I was sitting somewhere, eating and drinking stuff.
"I have to excuse myself for a moment," she said. "Would you take the camera? Get some good shots for the yearbook."
WELL!
That was an EDUCATION.
You get your subject just right--and it moves. You line up the perfect shot--and it dissolves. Very seldom do people just stand still--and when they do, the picture looks formal and contrived.
LIFE itself--perpetually moving around, dissolving, reshaping. Panta rei said the Greek philosopher--all things are in flux.
You can say THAT again!
I doubt if I got a single decent photo in those few minutes I went blundering around. Eventually (thank the Lord) my colleague came back--and I gratefully handed her back the camera.
SO--
--I look at these photographs and think, "Marvelous!" What skill, what love required--to immerse yourself (as it were) in the Big Apple--or any other place--
--and capture LIFE. People in the act of living--loving--playing--breathing--dying.
Merci beaucoup, Monsieur Laffont!
Merci beaucoup!
17
@Susan Fitzwater Beautifully said! You don't TAKE good photos, you need the skill to MAKE them and, as you said, the great love to make great photos, thank you
3
@Susan Fitzwater
Yes, very well written. And though I can’t speak for NYC – never been there – nowadays in most cities you also deal with orange traffic cones slipping into every photo in the brief second between composing the shot and hitting the shutter (..”that wasn’t there” you mutter to yourself later..); heavy traffic on every significant street; Day-glo joggers popping into the frame from all directions; neon-colored share bikes scattered all around; temporary Honey Buckets on every block; ubiquitous fluorescent yellow-green safety signage – holy guacamole, it’s a challenge. But it’s what makes it fun and great when things all come together. Usually accidentally for me.
1
There was a time when working class people lived in Manhattan? Wow!
21
Splendid!
6
As a Long time photographer, who started shooting film in 1975, and a native New Yorker, I must say, this is great work. To capture the realness and gritty actual of such an amazing city is to have real talent. Great images!
12
Makes me want to go back to film. Black and white film.
17
@Bridgman I did; it's not the hard to do a hybrid process. Lots of labs, scanners are cheap. Results are beautiful!
5
Marvelous photos - thanks!
14
Any photos of normal people?
8
@JQGALT
Given the number of photos capturing all sorts of people, it difficult to find a benign meaning to your question.
31
@JQGALT - What???
3
Any photos of abnormal people?
4
The photos you selected show much of the grit but little of the glamour of New York.
11
The grit IS the glamour. It’s the character that makes a city a city.
6
Yes, exactly. Thank you for putting (and capturing) it so well.