I am confused. There has been no attempt to reproduce perspective, position, angle, subjects, distance, or frame. I can understand wanting to foreground a different aesthetic, but that defeats the purpose of creating claimed "mirror images."
23
I enjoyed this - thank you. Two things stood out for me - how nicely people dressed in 1951, and no one was taking a selfie then.
14
Thanks for posting. Loved the contrast with both differences and similarities, but loved the fashion and clothing in the black and white much better.
7
I was struck at the way the people in 1951 were dressed so formally, while everyone is so informal in the photos from today.
The increase in diversity was interesting as well, very little in 1951 compared to plenty of diversity today.
7
It seems to me that, unlike the original photographers, who took time and care to compose their shots, Mr. Cenicola used his smart phone camera to make his instant images - but not photographs.
12
i suppose it was deliberate that the framing, composition and exposure of the current-day pictures were left informal, because that is how most of us snap pictures on our phones.
it does seem that pictures in the past had more gravity and perhaps more drama from the lack of colour. dare i say more care was taken because the photographer was limited by the constraints of film?
6
People in 1951 are much better dressed, and the cameras are way cooler. Men wore sharp hats and nicely pressed suits. Women had nice hats with veils. Cameras in 1951 included some very sharp Leicas. Those cameras were enormous fun to photograph with. 2019, everyone looks like a bum and takes way too many photos with a dumbed-down cell phone.
10
Ah 1951, back when NewYorkCity had relevance.
5
It would be better if the "same pictures, same places" were actually of the same pictures at the same places but 68 years later. Similar and nearby doesn't capture the same "before-after" that the title promises but doesn't deliver.
15
At Rockefeller Center in 1951, a young airman, just 3 stripes on his shoulder, is looking dignified in his dress uniform, the equivalent of a business suit. I wore the equivalent in ROTC. That's gone.
The clothing revolution seems to go back to the mid 1960s and possibly started at elite men's colleges. A 1965 Japanese fashion photography book "Take Ivy" documents the then-radical change. Of course I need to find a somewhat western shirt to wear to "Oklahoma!" where they serve chili at intermission.
Today, St. Patrick's today is looking splendidly clean.
While film cameras enforced care in setting up photos so as to not waste film, digital photography, done carefully, creates its own demands for good composition and perfect editing. The darkroom didn't die, it just went digital.
The new photos by Tony Cenicola are a reminder of how our eyes have shifted. The 1951 photos are classic, but not what we'd do today, sometimes because digital is a different medium, perhaps also because we see differently. The age of black and white is almost over. In my own editing, I'm more likely to increase color saturation than decrease it. A bad habit?
Cellphones? I have SLR photos of a tall floodlighted flowering cherry tree surrounded by the lights of a hundred or so phones. They were taking good pictures.
3
What strikes me is that 68 years ago most folks didn't dress like slobs.
14
what's clear is the magic of black and white film, black and white in general ... and careful analog film photography - including shallow depth of field related to lens focal length of film cameras
1
From class to crass in under 70 years. Once upon a time we were civilized. Now we're a circus.
4
I love the concept of this photo essay — comparison photos not of famous locations, but of tourists AT the famous locations. One of my favorite things to think about when I’m visiting a major landmark is, “Which one of the really obvious things I just said has been said by years (or centuries, or millennia) of tourists before me?” Like, think how many languages people standing in front of the Great Pyramid at Giza have used to say, “Wow, that’s really big!”
However, I think the essay’s intro was misleading. It did sound like the focus was going to be the locations themselves... which is probably why there are so many crabby comments about not lining up the shots.
5
So much more variation in the way people dressed in those photos from the past, and clearly attention was paid to sartorial details before going out. I only wish the inimitable Bill Cunningham were still with us (and the NYT) to give his take on how we’ve gone from “classy” to sloppy and boring, with jeans and an anorak becoming the preferred/only choice for almost any activity or venue.
5
People used to dress up to go down/uptown. Lots of hats, no blue jeans at all.
It was a white, Caucasian world back then; I didn’t see a black, brown, or Asian face.
I was born in 1951. Much has changed. Me too.
7
Everyone looks happy and healthier in the past. Also much more dapper.
4
As a child of the 50's, two comments:
1) There was no business casual dress option back then. If you worked downtown you were likely a professional or otherwise dressed the part. Visitors dressed up as well since a visit to the city was an event and NYC was a sophisticated place. Nice to see people wearing hats, good to recall it's almost all US made and probably with a union label. Interesting to think people could afford good clothes back then but will pay large $ for 'distressed' jeans today.
At the end of WW II the US was the only major industrial nation that hadn't been bombed and led the world in consumer products. Very unlikely those days will return.
2) Typical 35mm camera of the day shipped with a 50mm 'normal' lens for an SLR, 35mm medium wide for a rangefinder. A good portrait lens was 105mm. The image difference is in depth perspective and barrel distortion.
Typical smart phone lens today is the equivalent of a 28mm wide angle which is terrific indoors or in limited space situations. Otherwise, they make faces appear wider than reality and straight lines near the edges are bowed. If you concentrate on the center of the frame it's not too noticeable, but selfies are notorious for giving everyone a 'moon face'.
Photography in the day had a learning curve, but in terms of cost and quality (with a decent camera and photographer) there's no going back to film. Especially if you learn an editor like Photoshop... The ability to re-touch is amazing.
8
I loved to see how people were dressed in 1951. All seem to be so elegant and well turned out compared with the casualness and sloppiness of dress of people in 2019.
10
People obviously had a sense of public decorum reflected in their dress and behavior 68 years ago that is almost entirely lacking today.
Every one in the contemporary photos looks casual - wearing the same clothing they likely wear privately.
68 years ago, people are dressed to go out in a more formal way - with hats and suits for example.
These photos reflect what has happened in the private vs the public realm of life. People don't "keep up appearances" in public so much any more. They let it all hang out, all the time. I suppose this has desirable and undesirable impacts on our culture and civility toward each other.
But I can't help feeling that something has been lost, something has been torn of the social fabric holding us together - something very dear: the commitment of all people using a space to consider how their behavior and dress impact how everyone else is experiencing the public environment.
We have become more crass as we have become more casual. We are more selfish and less sociable today than in the 1950's.
13
The color of the recent photographs is obvious, but the other principal difference between the two sets of photographs is the focal length of the lenses. The recent shots are all taken with widish-angle lenses; the 1950s shots with lenses that are, I would guess, around 50mm. this has a dramatic effect on composition and relationship between subject and background.
4
I was six weeks old and we were living in Westwood, NJ. My Dad was working in NYC. I learned all that later, I have no contemporaneous memories. Cool pix.
2
Thank you for this. I'm not a New Yorker and I loved it! Especially the zoo pic. Timeless delight. Sorry to bring politics into everything but just today, watching Mr. Barr look so bedraggled and reading Comey's essay, it occurred to me how much I would like to see before and after pictures of DJT's people..... before they worked for DJT, and before they got fired or whatever. Reviewing images I have in my mind, many took quite a beating in those 2 years or so.
But back to the photo essay. Thank you!
Makes me wish I were a New Yorker.
10
What strikes me is how different the photographers are even though they are photographing the same subjects, and not simply because one is photographing in color and the other black and white. My conclusion is that Sam Falk's compositions in every image are far superior.
6
Everything and everyone looked better then.
7
The 1951 photos are a very homogenous population. Many people of color in the modern photos.
3
I'm a volunteer photographer for five major charities. Every now and then I get asked how much film I go through each year. My response is "Film? I haven't shot film since 2003." I realized back in 2006 that digital was better than 35mm film when I took the output from a Canon 20D, an 8 MP camera, and had a 20x30 made. I was stunned to see no grain, where I would see a 11x14 print from 35mm negative would be as large as I could tolerate. Go back to film - no thank you.
2
There is a cool app called Urban Archive has a feature to create then-and-now photo recreations yourself, with an iPhone. It has like 60k historical photos mapped all over the city from various institutions. (So everyone complaining about the angles and framing can try their hand at it!)
9
The NYC i knew was middle class. A working persons town. You went to a deli and when you asked for a regular coffee they knew what it was. NYC had its own flavor. Now it’s totally destroyed by money. It’s totally overhyped and oversold. The middle class are leaving which leaves only the insanely rich or the very poor. All that’s around that area in the photos is tourists. There are no New Yorkers with that famous accent. The city is like any other rich city. The tourists come here now like anywhere else to take Instagram photos at the sites to cross off their bucket list. Fake just can’t be real, no amount of money can change that
18
"Mr. Cenicola noticed people not stepping in front of his camera, displaying an ingrained photographic courtesy." In my work I often need to take photographs and I too have noticed this courtesy. I find this touching and just another example that most people continue to be kind and courteous.
8
Thanks! My beautiful young mother was expecting me in NYC in April 1951, so it is fascinating to see the world she was walking around in, and the world I was about to be born into. Literally another world. Everyone on the street looks so formal and dressed up, in a good way. Certainly none of them could have imagined the amazing changes of the 60's, 70's and beyond, but I guess it's always that way for the people we see in old photos. They are of their time, living in the moment. It's fun to circle back and see them.
9
The main difference one sees is how much people used to dress up when out and about in the city compared to now.
9
To sum up: people were better dressed, and photographers were more careful and thoughtful in composing their images.
16
The new photos are okay but they do not “recreate” the earlier set, and those black & white photos are much, much better.
11
They seemed better dressed than we are today.
6
People certainly dressed better back then!
8
Rockefeller Center April 2, 1951. The Gentleman on the left looks suspiciously like David Niven, the great British film Actor. Possible?
3
1951 = better times and better people. Yes, there was the HUAC and the Rosenbergs getting executed, but overall it looks like a much less stressful time to live.
2
All I noticed was how elegant the people pictured looked back then and what slobs we look like now. Is it important? I think it is. How we dress impacts how we act and how we are perceived and act towards each other. I know that if I'm wearing a nice outfit(dress, skirt etc) I act and feel different than if I'm wearing yoga pants or something. No one walking around in their jammies or with their pants halfway down their backside and their boxers sticking out either!
13
Comments are flooded with references to how well dressed individuals were versus now.
Keep in mind, travel to NYC then was mostly reserved for the elite due to finances/cost of travel, so for the most part, this limited the tourists to upper class who could afford well fashioned apparel.
Also, how many average, middle class Americans or tourists, owned the quality of cameras found in most of the photos taken in the 50s?...
3
The hordes of tourists now is frankly depressing. Moma is destroyed on the weekends with tourists snapping Instagram photos near starry night
6
I wish you had shown the contemporary photos in black-and-white as well.
4
What a totally lame article, the photographer made no attempt to duplicate the older photographs viewpoint. I was surprised how much that bolder eroded in a mere 68 years!
The Times actually pays this photographer?
Also with a finite amount of film the photos of the past were shot with much more care, I had a Nikormat in the 7Os and knew exactly how many shots of Kodachrome I had left.
15
We look like slobs compared with our parents and grandparents.
18
We were an elegant people once.
14
I love the black and white photographs.
They are crisp, distinctive.
There was real attention then to composition and light.
Now, use an iPhone and anyone can "take a piksha".
9
Neat!
2
flags flags flags flags, so many more flags.
2
Something that hasn't changed is the publishing convention of crediting the photographer, even sometimes over the creator of the photographed artwork. No better example than the first photos of the Atlas statue. The two photographers are attributed but no mention of the artist, scupltor Lee Lawrie. Consider how many hours and how much labour and creativity the artist put in versus the click of a button. There would be no photos without it! What does this say about our values?
1
Speaking as a professional and art photographer myself, this strikes me as the kind of exercise I would give to students, and I would expect them to do much better. There is little to nothing that is conceptual or intriguing about this at all. A curio at best.
17
I love this. I am saddened that it appears that most of the trees in the original photo shoot are no longer with us today.
1
So many people are commenting on the clothing in 1951. But do those same people dress up to go out? Everyone has a choice. What I notice is the lack of women in so many of the 1951 photos. Current day has men and women and people of all hues. I’ll take the variety of people over a heels, a massive coat, a hat and gloves any day.
3
In the 1951 photographs, everyone is neat and well-dressed. Their clothes fit, rather than bagging around their bodies. The 1951 people also look more fit and healthy.
15
We were a better dressed people back then.
12
Very boring photographs. What a waste of time.
I have been reading this newspaper since the 1940's. It has been going downhill since Punch departed. Where are the likes of Meyer Berger, Peter Kihss and Scotty Reston?
The New York Times should be spending its money getting real reporters chasing down real news stories. There is much to be done.
5
Looking at all those old camera reminds me that when you only had 24 exposures on a roll you really thought about what you took a picture of and then it really meant something when you got the focus, f-stop and shutter speed right. Now we just stare blankly into the numbing void of all this perfect digital visual cacophony. Everything now looks too perfect, like plastic does.
3
The originals were light years better to my eyes. Something is lost to color in its use in for pedestrian street scenes.
Black and white demands something of us.
Color is how most of us see the world. Yet, much of our daily lives, filled with color, become gray perceptions.
A black and white photo filled with the nuances of grays demand pause.
To my mind, the question: Isn’t there more? What is it like in person?
I imagine a great vibrancy in finding the spot of a black and white photo, then feeing it in person. There, with the impression of the photo in mind to contrast with the experience of the wind, the color of the scene and smells - that’s life.
But a color photo of a pedestrian scene? Gray.
7
I really enjoyed this. I love the contrast between photos, especially the one with the young soldier. This was a cool idea. I also really love that photo of the Central Park Zoo. This spring break I had the chance to visit New York and it was remarkable to see some of the places I went to sixty years apart.
1
Wonderful article. Makes me remember something my mom said years ago, looking at old photographs of people not related to us. I remember that they were taken around the time these were taken, 1952. I think they may have been shots of people at a suburban or rural train station, stepping off a stopped train or climbing onto it. “We were thinner, then,” she said. Her remark stayed with me. She was born in 1934. The people in the old photos in your article are thinner too than the people in the new photos.
5
Nice to see a lot of Leica model III's being used. A very popular camera in the 50's . I was still using my father's after rebuilding the shutter some years ago. The collapseable sumicron 50mm is still taking sharp pictures.
Go use film!
3
Well, I guess Sam Falk was just a much better photographer. The modern recreations are lame, and compositionally unfocused.
Sorry, but that is just so obvious.
14
I don't think you can compare the technique and art of taking a photograph with holding up a cell phone. Everywhere you go you see people not directly experiencing an event but rather holding their phones above their heads and pointing at something. No composition, no depth of field, no bright and dark adjustments, no focusing. I always see a picture in my mind's eye and then create the image I see.
1
Is it just me, but doesn’t “recreate” mean using the same basic camera angels and composition? These shots have a bunch of new folks taking photos of the same sites. So what? The sites still exist and the photos could have been much more closely recreated. I just don’t get the purpose of the exercise. If it was just to show how people dress or look today versus 1951, then why bother to use the venues at all?
19
As a professional photographer I offer this judgement: in every case yesterday's pictures are better than today's.
15
What strikes me about these photos is that the modern ones have so few people in them compared to the 1951 ones. Is this because, even in a city that encourages walking, people are doing less of it for actual transportation than they did in the old days?
1
One thing is for certain, folks used to dress far better in the day. The contrast is disheartening. Many men today seem to make no effort at all to coordinate a 'look'; merely content to sport a a wrinkled untucked shirt and a shabby pair of jeans. Au revoir, well-dressed folks.
6
If the photos show anything, it's the slobbing of America.
19
You can still find people on the streets today taking photos with the same cameras from the 1950s: the Leicas, Rolleiflexes, Zeiss Ikontas...
2
My god the originals are so much more dramatic, glamorous and...human.
Living in this hyper-connected, hyper-digitized time is stifling.
No love here for Tony Cenicola's shots. He should learn to use an analog camera, or use a prime lens that produces bokeh.
Then again, the sloven modern American isn't helping him.
12
Wow, people were so much better dressed in 1951! Thinner, too.
11
Men wore hats.
5
Thanks for the delightful "time travel." I ended the viewing experience longing for the more formal or less casual style of dress. I think we were more fashionable and looked better back then.
6
The more recent photos are more racially diverse.
1
@writeon1 The city was much less diverse in 1951.
1
everyone in the photos from 1951 look much more elegant and civilized
13
I like the shallow depth of field in the older photos as it gives the content a focus. My iPhone X tries to duplicate this but when I really care about the photo I take, I still use a dSLR.
5
It would have been nice if you had taken pictures at places that had actually changed from 70 years ago.
3
Interesting piece that it brings up the debate on clothing. The photography comparisons are mediocre at best.
Everyone has their own reality on what is considered "dressing up". Does "dressing up" mean everyone looks the same? In fact that is what I see, men in suits looking identical and women perhaps having a bit more difference in that patterns on the clothes are more diverse.
I think dressing up is really saying play it safe and look like everyone else. This applies to jeans today.
2
As an old analog photographer starting in 1953 ,I still love the analog camera lens perspective more than that of any digital camera.
Digital of course has it's own merits and reality ,but to see a photo made with a Rolleiflex ,Canon or Leica lens of that time ,makes me feel so much more of a unique intimacy with it's subject which we have lost in most digital photography.
2
People were certainly better dressed in the past. Love the hats and coats!
14
"We were here". People and posterity, how they see themselves and in the larger context never change.
I'm probably being annoyingly literal, and foolishly picayune, BUT . . . I usually find that comparing pictures of anything, taken at different times, is most fascinating when the angles and composition of the two photos are as identical as possible. In this feature, almost none of the pictures featured anything that one could compare. Otherwise, as a non-New Yorker, I have to take it on your word that this is at least the same general neighbourhood. What does these comparisons tell me? Not much, save that men don't wear hats much any more. (Except wretched baseball caps.) Next time you do a feature like this, please think of me!
14
@Katherine Collins
The "wretched baseball caps" even show up on inside shots . . .
5
One thing I like about the old photos - lots of Leicas :)
7
@Vince
I Leica that too!
The one photo on the steps at Rockefeller Center thankfully shows the return of one of the Paul Manship sculptures which had been missing along with its twin for years and finally discovered elsewhere on the grounds. They were returned to their rightful places on the plaza in 1984.
https://www.nytimes.com/1984/04/08/nyregion/2-works-to-rejoin-prometheus-after-50-years.html
5
I wish I were alive when people dressed so nicely for the every day. I know it wasn't, not really, not if you pay attention to history, but at least in these photos, it feels a more civil time.
7
@Deb The times were more civil and people dressed nicely everywhere, including in the small, rural towns. When compared to 1951, we have now made important strides in the areas of racism, sexism, and other tragedies of discrimination; however, good manners and style have largely vanished.
6
The more interesting aspect of this photo display for me is not what it says about photography, but what it says about who we are. There's an old saying, "Clothing makes the man." In looking at these photos, the one consistent real difference between then and now is how we are dressed. In the black and white photos, people are dressed in a manner which gives the appearance at least of more self-respect, of order, of getting dressed up for a stroll in Manhattan, of a certain pace and bearing to life. The contemporary photos by comparison show a people who dress in casual sports-influenced clothing no matter where they are. You go to the theater today and people look like they're at a baseball game. To me it both displays a lack of respect for oneself and for the place one is in. Nothing external matters anymore; it's all just about me and my comfort. There are no standards. Many people think that is a good thing. I would respectfully disagree. And by the way, these remarks have nothing to do with conservatism. I'm as liberal and progressive as can be ... just old-fashioned about some things.
25
@RLH well said.
7
Interesting that people still observe "photographic courtesy", now when everyone is taking pictures of everything all the time. In heavily trafficked areas, it becomes impossible to get anywhere unless you ignore the traditional courtesy.
On another point: too bad that certain apartment building is now in the background of the photos of St. Patrick's! I've felt that way about since long before the building's namesake became what he is today.
2
@Peter O'Malley
I think I have lost the feeling of "photographic courtesy " when the picture taking involves selfies, or people who take pictures of artworks where they don't even look at the works, but are often aggressively blocking other people from seeing.
2
I’m in my fifties and have lived in New York City all my life; born and bred in Manhattan. The “old” photos gave me a curious reaction; I think I see a lot of the city through black and white memories. I’m not colorblind, and although I do dress mostly in black (like many New Yorkers), there is a nostalgia in me for the real place I grew up in vs. the city’s current state. That’s what I see when I see when look at the earlier photos, and can picture my Grandparent’s lives as well. Of course, because of my age, my personal photos from childhood are all in back and white. While I enjoyed the comparison with today’s color, there’s a depth and richness I’m longing for that doesn’t come through.
4
Falk seems a much better photographer than Cenicola. His photos always have an interesting foreground/background dynamism. As well color photography is notorious, at least in "snapshots" for its inability to control for what color can do in a picture. Think of Hitchcock's Vertigo with its controlled play of grey, green and only occasional shots of color. This can be done in a narrative film so much more easily than out on the streets.
Not one of Cenicola's shots do more than document; Falk is an artist.
My two cents.
10
Very nice pictures, old and new.
There is another way of doing it, called re-photography. The idea is to retake an old picture during the same season, same time, same light if possible, same aperture, same speed, same angle and vantage point, etc. This is a manner of documenting the difference between the same place say 100 years apart.
I have a book called After Notman which shows the results of such a project, beginning with pictures of Montreal taken by the great photographer William Notman about 100 years ago. The modern pictures were taken by a variety of modern photographers. Very interesting.
5
I have the old Yashica camera my dad left me when he died. It has a fold-out flash reflector, a battery operated light meter and about a dozen control knobs. I also have the registration card the company returned to him, thanking him for registering his camera with the company. The postal stamp is dated 1958.
And no, I’ve ever used it. I’m all digital when it comes to that stuff.
What seems very clear to me is how people in 1951 looked like adults in public.
Now, the slob is the norm. Our special time.
29
@Plennie Wingo I totally agree. "Our special time" made me laugh. I suppose otherwise I would have cried.
11
@Plennie Wingo I'm a Californian and agree none the less!
6
People of these '50s era pictures took more pride in their appearance and were a lot thinner than the scruffy modern day folks with puffy jackets and bellies.
15
Just strikes me as lazy. Yes, I guess the “modern” pictures were in approximately the same location. But it would have been far more interesting if they had taken the time to perfectly align with the 1951 photo.
13
All you had to do was to try to replicate the image and angle.
I found the pictures very disappointing.
You say the objective was to compare amateur photography of today with the past, but you used a staff photographer who didn’t perform as well as I could have with my iPhone 6, and I’m not even an amateur photographer.
Disappointed to say the least.
14
One more comment about the apparel difference here.
I don't care so much whether people look "slovenly" now as what fabrics are being worn. Synthetic fabrics shed terribly and end up everywhere, including our drinking water and ocean life.
Wear sustainable clothing and mend your clothing when possible rather than tossing them to buy more. We're all in this together, folks.
18
One thing that I really miss - and is evident in these photos - is how well men dressed in public back in the 1950s. A jacket & tie, a pressed pair of trousers and spiffy brogues are commonplace. l wear a jacket and tie to work - and I am in the distinct minority.
While progress has been made in so many arenas of American life, how men dress in public has taken a turn for the worse.
21
What strikes me is how all the buildings are branded now. Even the base of the "Atlas" statue has an advertisement. Un-artful and defacing capitalist graffiti!
140
@Debra
I certainly agree with you in principle, but you picked a bad example, since the statue itself is an exercise in branding by the family that invented Big Oil and the capitalism based on it.
8
@Debra Look closer. The statue is mounted on a stone cuboid. In the 2019 photo, the cuboid is mounted on a larger cuboid (or other such object) with the advertisement on one of its vertical sides. In the 1951 photo, Sam Falk has apparently shot or cropped his photo in a way that eliminates the larger cuboid -- or perhaps it wasn't even there. So the offending advertisement may or may not have been present in 1951.
5
I think technology has lessened our appreciation of photography. Before, you selected your shots carefully, knowing the 24 or 36 shots allowed on your camera's film (which you paid for) wouldn't be available to you until you had the film developed (which you paid for).
Now, with digital cameras and cell phones, there is virtually no limit on the number of photos one can take. Run out of storage? Delete and take more.
My father was a photographer, and I always admired the great care he took in setting up a photo, taking note of composition and lighting, shutter speed and aperture. After spending hours in our basement darkroom, he would emerge with wet prints, and he would enlist my brother and I to help him put them in long blotter rolls to dry. The next day, Dad would unroll a collection of truly beautiful images.
Nowadays, I just can't appreciate someone holding a cell phone in one hand and taking a photo via a completely automated process that requires very little thought -- or knowledge -- by the "photographer."
165
@Steven True, but lots and lots of us still shoot film.. and technology has given us a way to share those images with each other in ways we wouldn't have been able to in the past. So it cuts both ways.
13
I share your point of view. Photography as a medium has changed to the point of extinction. As an artist I keep shooting film and collecting old cameras, because making a print requires different mindset in shooting. This makes me happy every day. Automation is around the corner and everybody’s phone will produce a shot with good composition and clarity. The craft of photography is lost and the only logical perspective in a world with instant video sharing and unlimited digital storage is to look at it like pure art form. I paint digitally but when I want to produce something of serious value i grab my brushes and oils. May be in the near future film photography will be like oil painting. Immortal.
11
@Steven lol, I am just the opposite. I remember making movies with film and cutting pieces together to make a film. I remember dragging my big bulky 4x5 field camera around with a total of 12 shots to take for the day. Then, home to pour all of those chemicals to make negatives, then a print only to find out it was slightly blurry! With the digital I know on the spot if I need to take another. And with no worries about film or the time it will take to process I take a LOT more pics than ever before.
19
Thanks for the pictures. I enjoyed looking at these moments in time from the past and the present.
The young soldier holding his camera and staring up at the building was so poignant. I imagined this as his first trip to the 'big city'.
The faces of the people at the zoo seemed identical from both eras. A sense of joy and wonder looking at the animals.
Yes, they did dress so much nicer 68 years ago...
99
@RH not to nitpick, but that young man is an Airman in the Air Force and not a soldier.
11
I worked as a clerk at Modernage on East 43rd Street in 1967 when I first got out of grad school. Black and white photography was magical to me, and I got to see all kinds of work as it passed through that great custom photo lab. I even got to speak to Walker Evans on the phone one time, and during my lunch hours I would walk around midtown Manhattan with my old Leica.
70
I like the "Atlas" photographs from Rockefeller Center the best. It is the dates they were taken are exhibited extremely well. Not simply black and white versus color; rather, the clothing worn by the photographers, the surroundings, and (of course) "Atlas" himself..
He (Atlas) looks more "vibrant" in color, but both still convey the same message: The weight of the world, carried on his shoulders. I love it.
31
I am sorry so many comments are focused on the exactness of the replication’s place. Look at what the human groups are doing—“Hey, everybody, Get up on those rocks! You will look like you climbed the mountain!”. Isn’t that the essence of all those rock formations in Central Park? And, just look at those faces at the zoo—equally lit up watching the animals, years apart, even if not at the same railing.
31
@carla okigwe
The banality of these shots is the problem. These are everyday people in familiar places. Shots of finely dressed people from another era hold some mystery and awe; tourists taking shots around Rockefeller Center and Central Park are boring and tiresome.
How to solve? By attempting to replicate as precisely as possible!
24
@Clotario
Rename the piece "Similar Pictures. Same General Location. 68 Years Apart."
I agree that trying to get the same angle and perspective would have made the photo essay significantly better.
I appreciate the article anyway.
18
i was born and raised in Manhattan in '52 so a lot of these scenes are very familiar. I look at the older pics and see things that dont exist anymore such as the double decker public buses, two direction traffic and street parking , and the distinctive two lens gold traffic lights on 5th avenue. The seals the seals in front of the arsenal in central park still attract crowds and it looks like St. Patrick's is in better shape than 51 when the grunge seemed to be taking its toll.
38
Nice but a proper coverage of street photography in New York city requires at least one photo of, or from the legendary Bill Cunningham.
4
There are several geological/geographical university press books "Then and Now" "Before and After" titles of surveys of the landscape in Nevada - trees in the past, no trees in the present, etc. But the angle was the same (as much as was possible). The angles were quite different.
Also, we have been watching some film noir(s) - what strikes me is all the night time foot traffic and the many small businesses (and their signage) that lined the streets, from shoe stores to corner drug stores - hey! what are those?
I generally carry a camera around with me. That often prompts people to ask me to take a picture of them. My favorite thing to do is immediately start taking pictures before they are in "the shot". It is my experience the best pictures are often the ones before and after the official shot. I hope that those same people think the same!
3
Funny how many people bemoan the lack of "dressing up to go out" of today.
Makes me wonder just how they and their friends and families dress routinely....we can't it have it both ways.
You couldn't pay me enough to go back to hair curlers (the night before, obviously!), hats, dresses, girdles, stockings, high heels and all the rest of what was considered "normal" to wear when out and about back then!
8
I thought this was fun and interesting. Like many others though, I felt a little down when seeing how schleppy we all look now.
20
What I noticed the most was the way people are dressed today versus 68 years ago. Most of the men were wearing suits and ties in 1951. The women or "ladies" back then were "dressed up." I remember my mother wouldn't think of going into "the city" aka Manhattan unless she was "all-dolled-up." Maybe it shouldn't, but it does make me sad to see our sense of formality disappear. I guess that's why I like to read "Miss Manners" in the Wash. Post.
17
Note that people dressed better decades ago.
16
I notice, people in 1951 were always presentable in public, even the children. In 2019, people care about how their clothes make them feel, not how they appear to others. Are we more selfish?
I notice the images from 1951 incorporate depth in their composition. With sharply focused foregrounds and slightly blurred backgrounds, they are more appealing. Their compositions and framing are crisp, allowing easy identification of the primary and secondary subjects.
I notice I cannot defend the assertion that the 2019 photos were maybe taken by a student of photography.
I notice good photos show some things, but always hide other things. A bad photo simply reveals everything, with no distinction.
13
@IN:
as the article stated the 2019 pix were taken by a NYT photographer.
Second: as to being "selfish" now for dressing comfortably? Explain that one, please!
1
Another great photo essay by the NY Times.
5
Love the vintage cameras and clothes!
8
people are dressed down today. people cared about their apperance back when.
20
They are the same location, except that we had opportunity to save the planet and be aggressive with climate change. Now here we are 2019!
2
@Mercibh I don't think people in 1951 knew about climate change.
2
As I expected, the moans of how "things were so much better in the old days" are coming in like waves. Some things were better, and some things were measurably worse then. I see nothing wrong with dressing for comfort. I would like to know if those who are decrying today's style still dress up when going to Manhattan on a leisure trip. If not...my advice is to (sorry for the modern "lack of respect") keep your mouth shut.
5
@Mitch4949:
I do dress up (in your parlance) whenever and wherever I go out. And I'm not someone from "the old days". I make sure my hair is well combed, my clothes are not wrinkled or sloppy, and my shoes are appropriate - never sandals (unless I'm at the beach).
It is a sign of having self respect, and keeping parts of our bodies private, rather than "comfortable" and exposed for everyone to see. I never wear "yoga pants" -- ever. It's not about being comfortable. I am very comfortable in my modest somewhat fashionable clothes.
It IS about selfish needs -- want to be comfortable even if it's distasteful. Our comfort now seems much more important than how we as a society appear. Slovenly unchic but comfortable is now ohhhh so de rigueur.
The "modern" American is destroying privacy & modesty.
11
These are NOT the same at all! Not even standing at same spot. Ever see the photos of someone holding a record LP up against where it was shot? SAME ANGLE. This is crazy. STAND IN SAME SPOT. Otherwise, don't bother. #WasteOfTime
71
The photos are not very close to the same framing so the effect is pretty diluted. An effort to compose the new shots so the changes are more striking would have been more satisfying.
39
I thought it was going to be photos of the SAME people. Disappointed!
2
@Ella: your sarcasm is "disappointing".
At least you didn't expect it would be the same photographer, with the same camera, in the same location, at the same time and date, with the exact same film!
Ohhhh, truly a let-down!
The TIMES should have directed photographers to EXACTLY match angle and format of the black and white shots: in not doing so, they missed the point of this exercise, completely.
34
@Rich Grzesiak
Could it have something to do with cell phone cameras, which, will greatly improved from their early years, still have limitations?
These pictures show how sartorial standards have plummeted.
This is quite unfortunate.
28
@JC
I beg to differ. As a young woman in college in the 1960s, I was thrilled to replace hard bras, slippery slips, tight girdles, garters, delicate expensive nylons, fly-up dresses, foot-binding high heel pumps, hand-held purses and hard-to-keep-on hats with clothing that allows me--and other woman--to move freely and enjoy our lives! We can still "dress up" in drag for the opera or a party, if we so desire, but need not suffer every step through a long day of walking!
4
I'm more amazed that window panes of the building of Saks Fifth Avenue(next to St. Patrick's) are still the same as 68 years ago.
5
I thought the comparisons were not that good, visually. The new photos were not aligned with care. This could have been a quality piece, but I give it a grade of -B, since execution was everything in this format. Sorry to be a downer, but that's how I see it.
81
@T.Curley I agree. The new photos look like snapshots with a smartphone by an amateur attempting to replicate the originals. Very disappointing.
17
I don't mean to nitpick, but every person taking the picture in the b/w photos ARE the primary subjects because everything else in the background is slightly blurred and not as crisp and detailed as the person holding the camera.
I love that - a person taking a picture of a person taking a picture.
Somehow that same effect was lost on the colored photographs.
The two side-by-side examples clearly show the stark difference between creating a professional work of artistry vs. merely taking a snap shot for the scrap book.
9
The focus you refer to is called Depth of Field. There is a science to it.
4
@Bryan
Thanks for helping me out Bryan!
Clearly whoever took those photos understood that science and was able to create such sophisticated beauty and elegance.
2
As I looked at the pairs of (new and old) photographs, I was reminded a classic book about photo interpretation and analysis. Kluver (1997) analyzes a day in Pablo Picasso's life from a roll of snapshots taken in the summer of 1916.
Kluver, Billy. A Day with Picasso. The MIT Press, 1997. 99 pages. ISBN: 0-262-11228-0
2
Canyons of steel. The visitors to your great city are always looking up! And like the Frank Church Wilderness, Yellowstone, or the Salmon River, I like to think that it belongs to all Americans.
5
I also have to comment on the apparel of each age. People today seem to have completely lost what was behind the effort, time, and cost folks in those days in the past put into how they dressed when out in public especially in a big city. It was primarily both out of consideration for others and a pride in how they presented themselves that drove it as well as the shame they would feel if they hadn't done so. I mentioned this on Twitter a while back and got thoroughly scorched by those who saw it as their inalienable right to be as comfortable as possible anywhere they went in any situation regardless of how they might appear to anyone else. As someone who grew up in those old days, I was rather flabbergasted at the vehemence of the response but that answered for me possibly why people dress so differently these days. It might also speak to how people treat one another in social situations as if etiquette in general should be seen as utterly archaic.
87
@Kevin Mac
I particularly notice the difference between then and now in terms of clothing when I attend the theater. I still like to get dressed up for that occasion as I always did back in the '50's when I first started to go to Broadway with my parents. Not every performance received a standing ovation either.
47
@Kevin Mac This was one of the first things I noticed in these photos. It's now casual, comfortable and what feels good. Far less attention is paid to grooming and general neatness and what used to be called, "modesty." Dress does reflect a society and its values.
36
@Kevin Mac
What a magnificent city!
I was born in '54, and up to the mid '60s people did really dress up when in public, particularly when traveling.
The difference in dress (almost 70 years apart) was the first thing that I noticed also. I don't exactly know why, but there is something that strikes as being more pleasant when people take the time to dress up in public, probably me just showing my age!
47
The then of 1951 vs the now of 2019. The landmarks and locations that exemplify New York City still endure. What has passed away is a formality of dress that once represented a collective recognition of what it meant to dress appropriately for when out in public. Those were the days of men out and about in suits, barbered, well groomed. What constituted masculine appeal. New York symbolized what was then the standard for sophisticated fashion for both men and women. No more. A unisex fashion now reigns throughout America. One that can be described as a just rolled out of bed and out the door look.
22
@Rose:
OK, but would you go back to those days? Hair curlers, hats, high heels, dresses every single day, and so on? I'm sure men feel the same way about suits and ties.
5
@Rose:
Our fashions now reveal that "doing things for others" is no longer "in fashion." Many now wear clothes that are "inappropriate" for the public.
Now, doing what YOU want (selfishly) is considered "good".
I wonder whether one day, spitting in public because YOU want to, will be considered "ok".
4
Spitting in public (or sometimes just dribbling while smoking) is already what people do. And urinating in public also has its backers.
5
Mark Klett, an American photographer, has brilliantly shot (I should say, he’s “re-shot”) photographs, often of icons like Yosemite, of the American West and then has paired them with older photographs. See his book, http://www.markklettphotography.com/books-summary/fhpvd8g86n0cp93ti04obisvpha0qn on second and third views.
Also, historians of old forest fires have often used “re-shots” of old forest fires to show changes in vegetation. See Nevada based fire ecologist George Gruell’s work. https://www.fs.fed.us/rm/pubs_int/int_gtr158.pdf
Bottom line: whether it’s New York City or Absarokee, Montana, the only truth is that people and scenes change, grow, grow old to eventually die off to be replaced by something else.
7
As others have said, the people dressed so much more stylishly and in good taste as compared to today in 2019. Today we see people walking along on Fifth Avenue near these sites that are in the photos in short shorts and skimpy tops. If they only realized how ugly they look maybe they would save these for beachwear. They need to view these photographs to see how ladies and gentlemen once dressed. How I miss those times but it was a different era. Our mores and values have changed drastically and unfortunately not for the better in my opinion.
46
@KMW I totally agree with you. No one knows how to dress today. When I was a kid and visited my grandfather in Bay Ridge, (50s) girls over 12 were not allowed to wear short shorts in the streets. Seems draconian. However, standing along side or behind people who apparently don't have mirrors is really appalling. I guess this why I love old movies!
22
@KMW
Keep the fabulous style of that era; dump the sexism, racism, homophobia and religious crusades.
26
It would have been nice to see details of the equipment used but I guess that’s not really the purpose of this piece. It’s a fascinating look, despite the misleading title, with the current photos being, I assume, shot digitally.
Maybe it’s the sense of time elapsed but there is a quality to the black and white film photos that resonates more deeply than the digital shots. There’s a depth and range to film that, when placed side-by-side with digital, still seems superior. The digital photos feel flat, cluttered, and extremely ordinary. As a onetime, somewhat serious amateur film photographer who used public darkrooms and does love her 12 megapixel iPhone camera, my opinion could be entirely subjective, even emotional and nostalgic. But I know enough of both mediums to know that there’s still some bit of magic in emulsion that’s not yet translating to 1s and 0s.
Thank you, NYTimes. The LATimes occasionally reaches into its incredible archives of my hometown and does similar stories which is my most favorite aspect of these great newspapers.
11
You know what struck me? The change in the people taking the photos. 68 years ago, its mostly white men. There are two white women (maybe one other type of woman in the Central Park Zoo photo) , but mostly its white men. Now look at all the different types of people. Not just taking the photos, but on the street. Big difference
27
Truly when America was great! People dressed much better than today! Also, the cars had style along with the people.
31
I can't help but notice how everyone is well dressed in 1951. Sigh......my mother never left the house without a hat, dress and gloves.
70
@Bill Whenever my parents went into the city my father wore a jacket and tie and a soft hat. My mother wore a dress and heels and was fully made up. The other big difference is the number or over weight people today. A very fat person in the 1950s was a rarity and it is now common.
29
@Abbott Hall I'm considering bringing back the white gloves when I see people sneeze or cough in their hands and then touch the straps on the subways and buses here. Yech.
8
@Bill:
and how do YOU dress "when you leave the house" now?
Wonderful article. It is so neat that it is in N. America!!! In Europe?!?! I love watching Roman Holiday & getting this lovely time warp feeling.
4
The color in the contemporary images seems so glaring and lacks nuisance, where as old black and white images are warmly artful.
7
I prefer the old B&W images in every case.
51
Not a very good job of lining up the photos. With the old photo in hand, it should have been straightforward to line up the 2019 shots.
8
Reading an article in The Times and commenting on it has also changed quite a bit since 1951. Love the cars and the way people dressed back then.
7
I only have one thing to say...Hats!
32
It's probably just me, but when I look at both sets of photographs in each setting, the b/w photos scream rich detail, elegance, and sophistication whereas the color photos are merely a glob of unorganized and disjointed fragments of blurred color.
Perhaps I was supposed to look at the same places but what I noticed were the people, especially those in the b/w photos. They truly made those moments pop!
56
@Marge Keller
“Perhaps I was supposed to look at the same places but what I noticed were the people, especially those in the b/w photos.”
Thats all about good compositions, which the b/w pictures have. Clearly, the photographer thought about it before talong the actual photographs.
The colour photographs on the other hand are a mess, no effort at composition and clearly no talent.
4
@Marge Keller
It’s not you, Marge. The 1951 photos are better. The vote seems overwhelming. It’s no reflection on the contemporary photographer. He had a thankless assignment: trying to mimic the best shots from another guy’s take.
I am getting a little bit interested in the 1951 photographer, Sam Falk. Not long ago, the Times put out a special section of dance photos culled from the millions of prints they are digitizing. If (big if) memory serves, Sam Falk’s name figured frequently beneath many of the best images. I’m curious about him.
I’m sure Times photographers’ inspiration has always outstripped their editors’ needs. Looking back from here, did Falk have a unique take on his time and place that deserves a retrospective? Just a guess.
At the risk of being busted for going off topic, thanks for your reply on the Joe Drape story.
Slightly back on topic. The NYT has an outstanding, but rarely deployed, horse racing photographer, Chang Lee. On August 18, 2013 the Times ran the best racing photo I have ever seen with a story about jockey Russell Baze. It ran full page (not the same on a phone). And it was framed so tightly it showed little more than the horse’s mane and an ear. Baze’s hands grip the reins, his head and shoulders poised above.
Photos can lie. If it wasn’t inevitable that man was going to clamber up on a horse and go for broke, this one is telling a whopper.
May it be a safe Kentucky Derby.
2
The first thing that strikes the eye is the formality of the Fifties. Almost every guy is wearing a suit and hat. Every woman is wearing a dress. In the present day no one is formally dressed.
23
@Richard Mclaughlin
On typical streets today, men/women wear "yoga pants", exposing body parts that once were kept private.
This juxtaposition reveals how more crude we are now, and more "comfortable" (in both senses).
10
Great article, well written. Happy are those who live in NYC and enjoy seeing these sights daily.
6
Disappointed. Most are landmarks that haven’t aged and still, no attention to the original angles or any attempt to really make a one-to-one shot. Have seen much more interesting comparisons on the web.
131
Exactly what I said.
11
@Witness Protection I agree with the other critics: sloppy, careless photo work, with no attention to composition that references the original photos. Looked at separately, in and of themselves, Sam Falk's b&w's indicate that the photographer gave some thought to composition, while Tony Cenicola's 2019 photos look like they were taken by tourists passing by with their iPhone. As for Burgess's accompanying writing - feh.
31
@Witness Protection
Agreed. Regardless of what may have been Cenicola's original intention, his photos, on their own, are just plain bad.
3
It would have been more interesting to take the new photographs in black and white.
Then a more revealing comparison could have been made without color being the most distinguishing feature.
57
Amazing how many Leicas in the hands of photography fans.
Lots of the finders, collapsable 90mm lenses. Fascinating.
13
@Bil and Marcia
I'm counting at least three Argus C3s as well. In contrast to the Leica the "brick" was inexpensive and took great snapshots. You can still get them for under $10 on ebay.
1
Black and white, night and day, the superiority and clarity of the images, faces, figures and forms form one generation to the next. Photography, as we knew and loved it, might simply have become a lost art.
13
@e pluribus unum
Compare the lenses on many of those cameras with those on cell phone cameras.
1
Wow, what a difference in the attention to dress and style.
102
Really getting around town! How many subway lines did you ride on to get to all these locations?
3
This photo essay held a lot of promise but fell short. I always enjoy old and new juxtaposed from the same position to see just how much (or little) changed over decades. In the case of these photos, the current ones were not taken at the exact spot and angle as the original, essentially rendering them useless to make detailed comparisons. For example, the shots from the rock in Central Park are not comparable because the apartment buildings in the background are nowhere to be found in the original photo even though there were there 68 years ago. Another example is outside of St Patricks, the original photo shows the full corner yet the current one very little.
Cenico could have done a better job by holding the original in hand and positioning himself and his camera at the precise spot and angle as the original. That would have made for a great feature.
285
@Marc Jordan Your critique seems to be that other photo-essays have used the approach of taking photos from the exact same spots, and this one doesn't do that. Yes, we've all seen those essays, and they are really fun, but this isn't those essays. The subject in these photos is people taking photos in the "same" geography. A frame-frame match would was not the goal.
8
@Marc Jordan Hi, I'm the editor on this piece. Thanks for your comment. These photos are recreations of the 1951 originals, but they are not intended to be exact replicas. The originals were candid shots, so to recreate them we had to get modern-day candid shots, since posing them wouldn't be in the spirit of this project. To get these images, the photographer waited at or very close to the original locations for people to start taking photographs spontaneously — and then got his shot. The "same places" in the headline refers to the spots in the city, while the "same pictures" refers to both our pictures and the ones being taken by the amateur photographers we captured. In any case, thanks for reading.
27
@Andrew S
“The subject in these photos is people taking photos in the "same" geography.”
Totally pointless. I’m with Marc on this one.
18
What a truly fun photo essay! Snapshots of the world and of humans engaged in fun, positive activities. Plus, a window on history and changing times. More like this please :-)
21
Interesting, but one cannot help noticing how well dressed people were in the old photos, and how slovenly we've become in the later years.
231
@Lee Paxton
...good authors too who once knew better words now only use four-letter words writing prose...
40
@Lee Paxton
Yes, that was my first thought too. I arrived in NYC in ‘51, a 3 yo from Ireland w/ my parents. Dressing up to go out was important then. You didn’t want to go out looking slovenly. Not so now!
72
@Lee Paxton
I noticed that, too. And the ubiquity of the down puffer coat!
30
I'm not an NYC resident (though I visit frequently), but how can the Central Park picture be the same? None of the buildings in the background of the "modern" shot look like they were built post-1951.
17
@Niel McDowell
Same location, different angle?
2
@Niel McDowell
Totally different locations. Just look at the rocks. They're not the same.
13
@jim
Same rocks, different angle? Not saying, because I don't know. As a photographer I am acutely aware that the same object may appear very different depending on the angle from which it is viewed.
3