Diary Picture - 20 Oct 2011

Halloween ghosts strung up outside a favourite old haunt - Cafe Lalo. 

For all my US friends who might have been caught up in the chaos of Sandy over the last few days... I'm thinking of you and hope you are all ok.

Diary Picture - 22 Oct 2011

A riot of colour on Washington street. Bright autumn sunlight and that feeling of limitless possibilities that I love about New York. The sky, the high-line, the cars all reflected in a shop selling the most amazing orchids. This is an alternate frame from a previous post from my series, Chasing Smoke.

Chasing Smoke - 12

The Skyline. The skyline? Isn't that a bit obvious? Well, yes and no. It is New York's 'face' after all and a fitting place to conclude this brief series. The skyline, like the city itself, is not one thing. With as many facets as there are angles to view it, and all of them wondrous and brutal. Whether you see it on foot from ground level, rising above the foliage of Central Park or from the observation deck of the Empire State, from the Staten Island Ferry or driving in from one of the surrounding airports, the outlines of New York's wonderful architecture against the sky, land or water, is a human marvel, a statement of what is possible.

In the better part of a decade spent there, I travelled to and from the city several times a week, and not once in all those hundreds of journeys did I ever see the skyline and not sigh with the satisfaction of profound happiness. My first rented apartment was on Remsen Street in Brooklyn Heights and I looked out over downtown Manhattan from the living-room window. I ran every morning along the promenade and each time, the same feeling of awe and potential and belonging, crashed over me. However, my favorite view was inevitably the most frequent. Living on the Upper West Side I would most often return via the Tri-boro bridge and there was always that point where the road crested, sweeping right and there it was; by no means the best aspect on the city compared to the classic views approaching from Red hook or the Long Island Expressway, but it was my welcome home.

For me, the enduring quality of this landscape is that it doesn't matter how brief a glimpse I get through trees or buildings or parting clouds, approaching or leaving, it still has the same effect. 

Day 6 - Leaving the city for the airport, I get one last fleeting view through the cables and bridges of the LIRR track as the train speeds to Jamaica, Queens.

Chasing Smoke - 11

The City that never sleeps.... Even when the residents do. One of the things that has endured is the sense of round-the-clock endeavor. No mater what time it is or where you are in New York, you are never more a than a few meters away from someone working.

Day 6 - 3 am in a pizza restaurant off Christopher Street, one of the customers slumps on the table next to a slice of pizza. Tiredness overcame hunger.

Chasing Smoke - 10

The cab home. "Shall we walk.... or do we have time to take a cab?" was another of those great New York truisms offered as wisdom to help my transition from tourist to resident. But late at night there is something at once decadent and comforting about whistling through the city. 

Day 5 - Heading south, Fifth avenue stretching relentlessly green in front of us as we ate the blocks from east mid-town to the village in the blink of an eye.

Chasing Smoke - 9

The Bronx. Maybe this is the borough that represents the closest thing I have found so far to that elusive feeling of New York. A feeling, an atmosphere that in truth, had nearly vanished from most of Manhattan even by the time I arrived in 1991 and was certainly a rare and precious commodity less than a decade later when I departed. I still can't describe adequately what it is, but you know it when you see it, and this felt very close. The latin music blaring out from an open window above a bodega, 'walk-up' buildings, a heady mix of community spirit, grit and getting through the hard life with a smile, snatching joy where you can find it.

Day 4 - East 151th Street and Courtland Avenue. telephone and power cables adorned with 'sneakers' outside the Bronx Documentary Centre where an exhibition of my late friend, Tim Hetherington's last photographs was opening. (More on that subject soon)

Chasing Smoke - 8

Again, the light. My father always used to say that wherever there's a traffic jam, you'll find a policeman trying to direct the cars. Not Here! A tricky junction, nearby street closures, one woman with a will of iron making it all run like butter in the sun.

Day 4 - West 14th at 9th Ave. The low sun of the evening bouncing in every direction.

Chasing Smoke - 7

To be young in NY. It is often said, though I don't know who first coined the phrase, that New York is only for "The very rich, the very poor and the very young." It's not true of course but I was quoted this by a long-time resident when I first arrived. He asserted that when I fell between these three groups I should leave.

Day 4 - A young couple kissing on the uptown 3 train, just after 72nd street.

Chasing Smoke - 6

Constant change. As the old joke goes, "New York is an amazing city.... its going to be FANTASTIC when it's finished!" Of course, it will never be finished, constant tearing-up, rebuilding and alteration is a big part of its allure.

Day 4 - A sidewalk on on Gansvoort Street, cobbles, tarmac, cement, concrete, hardboard, duct-tape, utilty line markings. History displayed like the rings of a tree.

Chasing Smoke - 5

The Light. A sunny autumn morning in New York leaves you with the sense that you could achieve anything. The colours, the reflections, the limitless possibilities.

Day 4 - A yellow cab barrels along Washington Street under the southern end of the High Line, reflected in the window of a florist. 

Chasing Smoke - 4

Flags. The very first thing I really learned about America is how the "Stars and Stripes" is so much more than a symbol in the national psyche. It is something woven into the very fabric of being American. I have never seen more or bigger flags anywhere in the world than in the US.

Day 3 - A construction site on 14th Street. Nobody working at this time of night but the flag is still lit up, fluttering in the swirling wind.

Chasing Smoke - 3

Coffee. Before the chains of interchangeable multinational beverage shops became ubiquitous in New York, there used to be little places that served what they described as coffee. Not 'latte' or 'cappuccino' or 'grande soya de-caff mocha' but its straightforward, unadorned cousin. Your choices were, black or white, sugar or not. Sometimes it was great, sometimes it was battery acid but it was honest either way.

Day 3 - A good cup of coffee at Cafe Gitane on Jane Street. At some point in the drinking you get a little skyline appearing from the caffein 'Hudson'. There are still lots of places if you look a bit.

Chasing Smoke - 2

Baseball caps. For me, a Yankees cap always looks vaguely fraudulent anywhere outside of New York...
Irrespective of how committed a fan the wearer might be.

Day 2 - My friends' son, staring curiously into the lens. Barely at pre-school and already a Yankees fan. Pinstripe in the genes.

Chasing Smoke - 1

In August I travelled to America for the first time in over a decade. I found New York in particular to have changed a great deal. Of course it's absurd to expect places to remain when we ourselves change constantly. So, on this visit I decided to photograph anything that evoked some kind of memory for me - whether real or imagined.

Day 1 - Croton on Hudson - Even though I've never been here before I found this scene instantly redolent of a certain aesthetic you see north of the city's suburbs and south of what could righteously be considered 'Upstate'.