Long before it was figuring into the plotlines of popular shows like Gossip Girl or luring in fresh-faced transplants with false promises of spacious lofts filled with likeminded creative types, Brooklyn was synonymous with the idea of hip-hop style. In Jamel Shabazz’s Back in the Days: Remix, a recently-released expanded edition of the noted photographer’s 2001 book, he theatrically documents the fashion that dominated early days of the scene — from the door-knocker earrings and Cazal glasses to the short shorts and oversized boomboxes.
“He did with pictures what rappers did with words,” hip-hop historian Bill Adler has explained. “He made these folks visible the way rap made them audible. He took everyday people and turned them into icons. Nobody told him to do this. He just went out and struck gold.”
For Shabazz, however, the motivation behind the images was much simpler. “It started for fun, but progressed into making people feel good about themselves,” he told The New York Times. “I’d approach them and say ‘Excuse me, brother. My name is Jamel Shabazz and I’m a photographer. When I see you, I see greatness. I see the future.’” Click through to travel back in time with a selection of images from Shabazz’s fantastic collection, and visit his website for more information on the book and his other work. Read More »
However unceasing our culture’s push towards modernity, there are, thankfully, some things that stick with us. In Fading Ads of New York City, recently published by the History Press, Frank H. Jump collects photographs of the fading ghost signs of New York, a project that he began after learning he was H.I.V. positive at age 26. Jump wrote, “The sense of urgency I felt every day drove me to document New York’s fading advertisements, and capture the marks left by artists and artisans, most long since dead, who spent their lives painting huge commercial murals over the last 150 years.” There are thousands of these fading signs all over the country, especially in New York. Some are beautiful in design, some are funny, some are almost gone. Click through to see a few of our favorite finds, from Jump’s book and beyond. Read More »
Depicting derelict cars and graffiti-covered vans that your mama warned you to stay away from, Kevin Cyr’s hyper-detailed paintings of grimy vehicles are broken-down gems. His series ranges from random vans he documented in Brooklyn (of the Vandura, Chevy, and Econoline Chateau variety), to various delivery flatbeds, and creepy ice cream trucks. The oil (and sometimes silkscreen) works on panel are almost reminiscent of Matchbox toy cars that have been destroyed with a Sharpie — but their photorealistic details make these paintings far from a mere caricature. The inclusion of vehicles with brand logos (we’ve always loved the Utz girl) bring up questions about commercialism. Check out our gallery of Cyr’s paintings past the break.
Read More »
Last night, New York hosted its second annual incarnation of Bring to Light: Nuit Blanche, the nocturnal art party tradition that originated in Paris in 2001 and has been taking the international art scene by storm ever since. Over two dozen cities worldwide participated in the festival last night, including Florence, Brussels and Toronto, and our very own home city of New York staged the festivities in streets, parks and warehouses along the waterfront in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The gorgeous and strange site-specific light, sound and performance pieces cut through the rainy night, creating an atmosphere of shimmering wonder for all who attended. If you missed it, or just want to relive the evening, check out some amazing photography from the event after the jump.
All images courtesy of Aaron Colussi.
Read More »
This week marked the release of Literary Brooklyn by Evan Hughes, a new chronicle of the borough’s literary history and author residents, which is getting some serious buzz. We’re excited to read it, but to tide ourselves over we thought we’d continue our literary love letters series with a collections of odes to the “rougher” side of the river. We’ve pulled from fiction and essays by residents and non-residents, but Brooklyn lovers all. Add your own favorite passages about Brooklyn in the comments, or feel free to make up your own odes to our fair city. How many words rhyme with ‘hipster?’
Read More »
Brooklyn-based graphic design team Two Arms Inc. have recently released the first two installments of their Brooklyn Neighborhood Series, wherein they will design posters representing each neighborhood in the eastern borough. The designs are simple but elegant — Two Arms pulls essential, representative elements from each neighborhood and juxtaposes them for a warm and fuzzy, almost nostalgic feel. So far, they’ve only released Williamsburg and Greenpoint, which is probably a smart move — we bet those are the areas with residents most likely to buy a poster of their hood — but we’re excited for the rest. Click through to see the posters, and let us know which elements of your neighborhood you’d want to hang proudly on your wall.
Read More »
Fantastic and thought-provoking American photographer Bruce Davidson recently received the Outstanding Contribution to Photography Award at this year’s Sony World Photography Awards in London, acknowledging a lifetime of photographic excellence and important documentation of the Civil Rights Movement. His celebrated work — one of his photographs was famously used for the cover of the Beastie Boys’ Ill Communication, plus, you know, he got a Guggenheim – is incredibly humanizing and beautiful, and Davidson seems to see his subjects as they see themselves, allowing the viewer to move among the images undetected. Click through to see a few of our favorite photographs from the World Photography Organization exhibit, and check out his Magnum Photos page or the 2010 book of Davidson’s work, Outside Inside, for more.
Read More »
LEGO brick by tiny LEGO brick, Boerum Hill resident Jonathan Lopes is building a city in his 400-square foot living room. The train scene has taken him close to four years, and in it seeks to recreate as closely as possible the places he sees walking around Brooklyn every day. “It’s challenging to achieve certain aesthetics with the limitations of the brick,” Lopes told the Daily News. “I try to get it as real looking as possible.” That’s quite a feat, considering that Lopes is something of a LEGO purist – he doesn’t paint or otherwise alter the bricks in order to get them looking like the streets of Brooklyn, but instead relies on his creativity, working with what he has to achieve the effect he wants. And the man’s got a lot of LEGOs: Lopes has collected about half a million LEGO pieces to choose from – which makes sense when you consider that something like his replica of the Williamsburg Savings Bank requires about 12,000 alone.
Lopes is almost done with his Brooklyn scene, but as soon as it’s finished, he’ll be breaking it down for its parts. That may seem hasty, but he’s already thinking about the next thing in his head – for the holidays, he’s planning a LEGO recreation of “The Last Supper.” We have to say, we can’t wait to see it. More photos, including some crazy detail shots, after the jump.
Read More »
Hipsters and artists should be a match made in heaven. Hipsters build their hyper-cultured lifestyle around the art scene, providing the artist with an eager audience that is sometimes large enough to launch an underground nobody into the mainstream spotlight. As symbiotic as that sounds, underlying these superficial benefits is a whole lot of tension, expressed best in the flood of irreverent, hipster-centric art we’ve seen. Now, we’re going to start keeping score. Who gets the last laugh with these pieces: hipsters, artists, culture in general, no one at all? Find out after the jump.
Read More »
The New York Times has, it seems, finally admitted (if implicitly) their completely pussy-footed outsiderism when it comes to Brooklyn. This week, their popular 36 Hours travel feature, which has recently covered cities such as Santiago, Lisbon, Valencia, Santa Cruz, and Marrakesh, has turned its gaze on Brooklyn, the borough the NYT loves to awkwardly love. Though they did make some good (if obvious) choices for a hypothetical weekend across the river (Tom’s Restaurant, the Brooklyn Museum and the Botanical Garden) they also left out some serious (and also obvious) draws (the Brooklyn Flea, Roberta’s, the whole of Red Hook). But we know they had to make choices, and not everyone can hang around in Brooklyn forever. However, we imagine that certain parts of the article could be a little obnoxious to Brooklyn natives, as, true to NYT fashion, they kind of miss the mark when it comes to talking about their other half. Click through for the 6 most annoying parts of their 36 Hours in Brooklyn, and our indignant rebuttals.
Read More »
