Category — Site Authors

“Would you like something to eat?” I asked my cousins, who had just arrived from England.  “It’d be great if I can get some crisps” one of them responded.  I stood there transfixed, wondering what in the world crisps were.  When they tried to explain, I learned that it was definitely some sort of snack.  I eventually had to resort to the always trustworthy Google, which told me that crisps were what we call chips in America.  This was the start of an extremely long and confusing two weeks; my cousins had come to visit from Europe, and although we all spoke the same language, I couldn’t comprehend a huge portion of what they were saying.  They spoke fast, and often I would really have to concentrate in order to understand what they were saying. Sometimes they would laugh at me, and would say, “American are slow”.  Being younger than them all, I tried to remain respectful to them, but eventually I would often have to respond.  “The best thing that the British have given the world is Harry Potter,” I once said, in response to a comment they had made to mock Americans.  Joking around about our different cultures helped us get along with each other.  Our trip to Canada (to visit family) also helped us get along with each other, as we joined forces to make fun of Canadians.  When time had come for them to leave, I was able to keep up with their fast language, and for a few weeks after they left, I had even picked up a little bit of their accent; but I made sure that I eventually dropped it.

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I found deciding upon a theme to be difficult. Both the canvass and inspiration for the project is New York City, arguably the most multifaceted and diverse place in the world. I couldn’t just pick a New York theme; instead I decided to take a more artistic route. I like playing with the emotions that various color palettes generate. A happy face can seem empty if the tone is pale while an inexpressive face can appear vivacious given warm shades and depth of color. Setting out to photograph that which I saw, I aimed to photograph familiar objects and scenes, and make them more interesting by polarizing colors, so to speak. Half of the photos, having been tweaked and edited (although never cropped) should feel cold, half should feel warm.

The setting for my album ranged from uptown to downtown, east side to west. Most of the photos come from the general vicinity of Grand Street Station and the 96^th Street Station. I did not set out with my camera and a goal, but I finished with ninety-two photos and an idea. I managed to capture a lot of photos that I liked; the trouble was a general blandness in image tone. I quickly came to recognize that in order for others to appreciate the photographs, I would have to doctor the images to elicit certain responses. At the same time however, I wasn’t interested in extreme cropping, cutting and pasting etc. I just wanted to brighten, darken, define and focus the pictures in a more thought provoking manner. In other instances I like working with grayscale but these photos seemed to require bright dashes or thin sprinklings of color.

Most of the subjects of my photos are the things we pass each day, either blindly or uninterestedly.  Many of these objects and subjects seem to have sort of mysterious back-stories, and I tried to make the photos more artistic in a sense, in an attempt to emphasize this. Main ingredients of various shots include a faded fallout shelter sign, an abandoned construction worker’s hat, a shoe hanging over a street lamp and an American flag.

I hope viewers can immediately sense the warmth or darkness I’m attempting to portray in each individual photograph. I played with tools that I felt would maintain the honesty in each picture but advance the intrigue. In this day and age, a photograph can certainly be classified as fictional or nonfictional, one can literally create a highly realistic image out of nothing. I didn’t want to sit in the gray area here, my pictures are true, enhanced, images.

The final thought I want viewers left with is a sort of obligation to make double takes when passing the things one sees all the time. It’s easy to ignore scribbles on a wall or abandoned personal artifacts but these things are interesting, and unique. I hope my play on a handful of ignored elements of New York City inspires people to slow down once in a while, and appreciate the remarkable contrasts between a neon sign and a dark street or how depressing a corny, worn-out bumper sticker can be. My photos are things that you’ve seen before, but presented in a new light.

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In a city of approximately 1,537,195, we see so many faces that we rarely stop to look at or think about a single one. Yet faces are so often represented on city walls, street corners, inside subway stations, on storefronts. I thought that the representation of faces in the city was an interesting topic to choose for street photography, because of how they are manipulated, depicted, tampered with, and how even very abstract pictures have a familiarity about them that lets us know a face is there. I chose to order the photos from most objective to the most abstract.

The first three faces are pretty clear and realistic, but they are partially covered. The first is a photo of a sticker of Kim Kardashian place on top of an advertisement for Camel Cigarettes. Though I initially thought this was the most straightforward of the images, but upon further research I found that it displays a very subtle political message. Her cheek says NOH8, which I found out was a group of celebrities’ protest against the passing of Prop 8 in California, banning gay marriages. The second photo is a cardboard cutout of a man representing the New York Lottery and holding a sign over the bottom half of his face announcing the amount that is up for grabs this week. I found that when I cropped the picture to show only his face, he looks silly in a way. The third photo is an advertisement for the movie “Burlesque” in which Cher stars, but a simple dripping line of black paint over her eyes made it very disturbing to me.

The next next two are faces that have been photographed but look odd to the viewer because of photo editing. The fourth is a sticker advertising the band Naked Highway’s new album. The pink background contrasts with the black and white floating head, and how his mohawk and tongue sticking out makes him look like a drawing. The fifth picture is a poster of Katie Holmes, but the photo has been edited to look cartoonish and she was given the face paint of the Joker in Batman. I’m not sure of the meaning behind it but it has quite an eerie feel.

The next four photos are all cartoonish faces that are very unrealistic. The sixth picture I initially liked because it is an outline of a man’s face who is holding a tea cup that also has a face. I see this sticker often and I found out that it the “Where’s Cloud?” movement started when a man won a creativity contest and $1000 earlier this year that he used to travel across America and put these stickers everywhere. The seventh picture is of a stick figure that I found on a wall in Chinatown. It seems simple but also unique because of the way it is drawn: the mouth seems to be a half smile and half frown, but the halves are not in the middle and instead are on opposite sides of the face. The eighth picture is a cheerful little fellow with an oddly large mouth. The creator Dint Wooer says “he’s a goofy face that people like, he doesn’t mean anything.” The ninth photo is an abstract landscape with the sun shining on an otherwise dull town, with a simple but elegant face.

The final three photos are the most abstract and interesting to me. The tenth photo in my project is of a Mamma Mia advertisement in a train station that has been torn off but left an imprint of the coloring and part of the star’s face. My eleventh photo is of a face that seems accidental; it is a sticker of a man with a suit and no head, and another sticker of an O strategically placed on it’s neck, behind the O is the remains of a colorful sticker that has been mostly ripped away. This photo is different because it still looks like a face to me although it has no facial features. Finally, my last photo is of a smiley face that I found in a small crevice of a building in Brooklyn, I thought it was nice to conclude with because even though it is the least detailed, it means that someone stopped to put a smile there where it will always be seen.

I found that the trouble with executing my project was not in finding the faces on the street, but that there were an overwhelming amount that I could not choose which to photograph and which 12 fit together cohesively. All I had to do to get the photos for this project was take a walk through the city streets but pay extra close attention to the walls.

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Growing up in Queens, I was an avid fan of Spiderman.  I would often dream of slinging from skyscraper to skyscraper, and swooping down Manhattan streets to save the day.  Although, I will never be able to do this, through photography, I can always capture the views of the city that Spiderman would probably see a lot of if only he existed.  In this gallery, I display different views of the city, including ground level, aerial, and distanced views, in order to display the immense size and the speed of New York City.

“Karnveer! Pay attention to the directions, and stop taking pictures.  We just missed another turn because of you” Brandon yelled frantically. Brandon, Tracy and I were driving to the Metropolitan Opera to watch Rigoletto, and I was the GPS system (reading the directions).  Both Tracy and Brandon were worried about being late, while I was calmly taking pictures of everything that caught my attention.  My deviation from reading the directions had caused us to miss a turn, but it was worth it, because we eventually made it to the Metropolitan Opera on time, and I got my photos.  These photos were taken in the night, and were taken from ground level.  One of my favorite photos taken on our journey was of the twin buildings of the Time Warner Center. I thought the photo was very unique due to the contrast between the vibrant red lights from the cars, and the blue and white lights coming from the buildings above.  Another one of these photos that I really liked was “Blurred City”, because I took it when the car was moving fast, and due to the speed, the lighting came out fuzzy; it captures the theme of speed that exists in New York City life.

If you want to feel like you are on top of the world, nothing will provide you a better feeling of this than looking down from a New York City skyscraper.  In July and August, through a summer program I was in, I was able to access some very high vantage points at some of the biggest buildings in New York including the Sony Tower, and the law offices of Winston and Strawn at the Met Life Building. At these incredible heights, the city appeared to be toy-like. When I looked out of the windows at these buildings, especially at the Sony Tower, I was amazed by the seemingly infinite amount of buildings lined up one after the other.  While at the Winston and Strawn office, I was awestruck when I looked down at the speed of New York City; cars and people raced up and down the city streets and showed no signs of stopping; with my photos, I tried to slow it down.

Some of my favorite photos of New York City are actually from outside of the city. The “Sunset from Queens” photo was taken from the Van Wyck Expressway; in the backdrop of this photo, you can see the New York skyline in a reverse fashion.  Here, these larger than life buildings appear microscopic.  Although the photo is taken from a great distance, the skyscrapers are still visible, showing their tremendous sizes.  To take this photo, I had to pull down the window, and hold out my phone firmly, making sure I didn’t drop it.  My dad constantly reminded me that if I dropped it, he wasn’t going to pay for a new one, so I was definitely under pressure.  The other photo that I took from outside of the city was the “The Empire State Building from the Queensboro Bridge”.  This photo appears blurry, because it was one I took while we were heading away from the city, and I had to position myself in an awkward position to take it.  These two photos were much different from the other ones I took, because they look at the city from the outside.

With it’s heaven reaching skyscrapers, and rocket fast life style, New York City can’t possibly be captured in a few photos.  But that hasn’t stopped me from trying.  Over the past six months I’ve really been exposed to New York City, and wherever I’ve gone, I’ve snapped photos of everything I’ve seen.  In this album, I’ve included photos that capture the size and speed of New York City.

If you ever need a simple memory card reader for your camera and would like to immerse yourself in a “culturally enriched” atmosphere, you should check out B&H Photo Video on 34^th street and 9^th Avenue. It may be the most unique store in Manhattan. As you enter you’re greeted twice. Continuing to walk down a wide hall with a fork in the road,  you’ll find product department maps hanging above your head and a third person to greet you and help you navigate your way about the superstore. Cameras, phones, computers, cell phones, alarm clocks, batteries, and little fuzzy pouches for your iPod nano are about.
The first thing you’ll notice is the assembly line that hovers products either overhead or behind counters. My little six dollar card reader would be bagged by one of employees catering to fifty or so booths at the photography department, dropped into a green plastic tray that’s tagged with my receipt, and routed to the pick-up area. I’d take a receipt and make my way back down the stairs, as the escalator goes only upwards, and head to the payment area, where one of four cash clerks or one of ten credit card clerks will take my money from me and offer me another receipt to pickup my purchase. The process is systematic and the methodology is brilliant and efficient to an extent.
Virtually every person working at the department counters is male and Orthodox Jewish. The salesmen who work the floor are male Orthodox Jews. The cashiers that handle the money are male Orthodox Jews. The information guide, however, was a Hispanic woman. The second person to welcome me in after the doorman was a Hispanic woman. The person who checked in my bag was a Black man. The person who looked for and gave me my purchase of the assembly line was a Hispanic man. The person who gave me back my backpack at the bag check this time a Hispanic man.
I thought that something was wrong, that there was a certain level of discrimination that should have already resonated in legal channels, but in reality this was the solution. In October 2007, B&H settled a multimillion-dollar lawsuit for discriminating against Hispanic workers. In November 2009. B&H was sued for $19 million for refusing to hire and discriminating against women. Status: Pending – go figure.
The stores track record and current atmosphere is allegorical of America’s history in general. Our system is extremely efficient and productive; we champion services rather than production to other; we departmentalize our government with bureaucratic scrutiny, but disappointingly we still champion discrimination de facto.

Addendum
This is absolutely not intended to singling out Orthodox Jews as racists, but to provide an example that illustrates the stark reality of general discrimination in American society. It just so happens that this was the store I went to and found a blatant contrast in job detail vs. gender and ethnicity.

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The theme for my street photography project was unplanned for the most part. I started out by carrying my digital camera around with me whenever I went out and basically just took pictures of anything I thought was worth taking a picture of. I didn’t have an idea in mind, but simply capturing some images was the first part. When I found out that our topic didn’t need to be constricted to just city streets, more ideas came to me. My mom, who takes pictures of anyone and anything, gave me tips on how to take pictures by dividing the image into sections before taking a photo. So this year when I went to Alaska for a summer trip, I used those techniques to take good photographs. Since I knew I had good photographs from Alaska and good photographs from the city, I decided to combine the two topics into one.

Brooklyn is my home. I was born and raised here and love it. There’s no place I’d rather live than in New York. But for the past two years I’ve gone to Alaska on a wilderness trip and I have been the leader of the trip, working with the project coordinator/founder to organize everything. Over this time, I have grown to love the wilderness. Being in the city all the time, I love being able to get away from it all with the beautiful views and experiences nature has to offer. From these experiences, I now want to own a summer home in Alaska in the future and have already started talking to the project founder about taking over his house in Alaska when he decides to sell it. I’ve adapted so well to the culture change and I feel like Alaska is a home to me because of my comfort level there. With all that being said, this was the inspiration behind my joint topic. Brooklyn IS my home but Alaska gives me a homely feeling. I wanted to join these two places to show who I am and the environment I am surrounded by.

New York is known for its constant movement and liveliness. Alaska is known for its scenic views and snowy mountains. You would think that taking photographs of views would be easier in the wilderness because all it is is nature, no real liveliness. But that wasn’t the case for me. I had most of my trouble taking the photographs in Alaska. One image that was especially difficult to capture was the image titled, “Eagle at Ease.” Being on the water and moving, it was hard to get close to the eagle without startling it. I had to be very silent while taking my camera out and then I had to focus the camera on the eagle while still maintaining the background shot. It took me a few tries before I was finally able to capture the image successfully.

Aside from the challenging or un-challenging aspects of taking these photographs, I also had some luck. For example, the image titled, “The Sky is Falling” was simply fortunate timing for me. After sleeping on a mountain, I woke up to clouds and fog covering over the mountain tops that were next to us. I basically stumbled upon it. There was nothing difficult about it, just luck. Another lucky photograph I captured was “The Speed of Light.” I took this photo while trying to capture any images I could of street photography around my neighborhood before I had a set topic. I was walking around taking pictures of cars, street signs, stores, etc. While taking a picture of traffic moving along my street, a taxi cab happened to have drove past my camera as I was shooting the picture. What came out was a stream of light that I thought worked well and looked good. To me, it captures the idea that the city is constantly moving at a pace we can’t keep up with, and that the lights of the city holds the power that dominates the city, as shown in my photograph, “Night Light from Brooklyn.” At night time, lights from all over (cars, buildings, street lights) fill the city with color and energy, which make the city what it is.

The two different focuses in my street photography project are completely different yet they each possess their own significance and splendor. These photographs aren’t just pictures to me. They hold meaning too…which may be why I decided on these certain photos to display.

I did not use any photo shop for any of the photos because I tried to keep the images just as they were when I shot them and didn’t want to alter their appearance.

The city is constantly growing with buildings being erected left and right and ever more people moving in. It seems that nature plays little to no part in the city’s growth, always laying under the shadows of the large sky scrapers. However, what seems to be true does not always mean that it is true. In fact mother nature is making a come back with quite the vengeance. If we walk around the city and look closely at man made structures, we witness natures battle. The trees cover up buildings and bridges to make a statement that nature is the focal point. But in the end a compromise is possible, mother nature and the big apple can work together to make a beautiful statement.

The photos I took represent a long struggle between the green and the grey that dwells in New York City. First we look at the night life of the city. It most certainly seems that the city is running rampant creating a morning without the sun. The general audience does not seen any signs of trees or grass, not even a weed can survive in such a harsh environment. Then we jump to scenes of nature and realize that there is a hidden beauty in plants. These flowers to many people’s surprises are located in various locations throughout the city, however there beauty is often ignored. The last couple of photographs depicts a gradual take over by nature. We see how there is some leaves encroaching on the right side of the photograph, trying to make its appearance. As the photos progress we see more and more of nature covering up the city’s creations. However, it is not right to just believe that nature will completely take over the city. Ultimately a compromise between nature and the city create the most beautiful scenes known to man. The final photograph depicts a collaboration between the great city itself and the sun rising in the background, and it creates a magnificent sight that all the rest of the photos lacked.

Color is of a necessity in all the photos I took. The kind of colors I used and lack of color reveals the moment. The night time shots of Times Square truly reveals the sheer power that New York City is known for, the ability to create an artificial day time as if man was mocking nature. The close up shots of the flowers gives us a close sight at the petals and the intricacy of nature. There is a city within the flowers and we see the flowers for its true beauty. The rest of the photos show how leaves are slowly taking back the land and it was necessary to slowly show a progression, so the audience could witness the gradual take over. Once again color is important to give life to the moments captured. The final scene was the most epic scene of all the photos. Not only did it take a great amount of effort waking up early enough to capture the moment but it shows that when two things come together it creates something significant. I used photoshop minimally create blur effects in some photos and clear up the photographs, but largely the photos were left intact.

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New York City is known for its majestic skyscrapers and architecturally brilliant buildings. One can basically wander into any Manhattan neighborhood and witness a beautifully designed building. As urban developers attempt to construct these wonders, they usually fail to incorporate alleys. They mistakenly believe that alleys are an “elite waste” of space, which could otherwise be used to increase the square area of the building. However, alleys are not only part of the city’s history, but also they are symbols of the lost culture. Alleys are a place where a group of individuals can exchange information. In addition, people are able to commit crimes, such as selling and buying illegal items or simply attacking and murdering other individuals. Without such places, New York City would not have the same atmosphere. As modernization tightens its grip on the city, alleys are diminishing all around due to the lack of appreciation for their historical value.

Alleys are of great interest to me due to their functionality. Over the summer I was working this job that required me to be outside for hours at a time. It was quite difficult to find a place to use the bathroom; instead I looked for the nearest alley in order to relieve myself. Throughout the whole entire summer, I would always end up in a strange section of New York. As a result, my daily assignment became looking for an alley so that I may relieve myself. As the days went by, I paid more and more attention to the detail and the size of each alley. As my fascination grew, I found myself using the bathroom more often mainly as an excuse to take a break from my job to observe the interesting aspects of each alley.

When the street photography project was assigned, I knew that I wanted to display the beauty of alleys in New York City. I proceeded to East Village and Greenwich Village to capture the essence of alleys and their importance to the splendor of these distinct neighborhoods. During the whole process, I was heavily influenced by Berenice Abbott’s style of shooting photography. Thus, I proceeded to take photographs with a focal point somewhere off in the distance, while using walls and gates as a guide. To my amazement, it wasn’t difficult finding the perfect alleys I wanted to capture. Instead, the hard part was actually taking the photograph, as people didn’t want me to document the alleys. Whenever someone told me to go away, I would stay just a moment longer in the hopes that I would be able to photograph that particular alley. I truly felt like a photographer when I repeatedly disregarded the warnings of those individuals who told me to go away.

As a warning, not all of my photographs are of the traditional alleys. I interpreted alley as a narrow passageway between walls, gates, or fences. For this project, I only had a 5-megapixel-camera phone at my disposal, so when I had taken all the photographs I went back and edited most of them to get the best results. During the editing process, I played around with the exposure and contrast levels to achieve the perfect lighting and details for the photograph. Even though I didn’t want them to be edited, I found it necessary because of the poor lighting of the raw photographs.

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When I set out to build my portfolio I realized one thing: I would be a godlike photographer if I could freeze time and assume any angle for my shot. However, things aren’t that simple. Photography takes courage and a certain artistic sort of confidence that reciprocates the esteem of the introvert poet. Any of my former art endeavors were rooted in the latter, and this influenced my approach to taking these photographs. I used a Sony DSC-TX7 point-and-shoot camera that was essentially at belly button level and I just took countless random photos as I was making laps around Union Square park, the almost cliché cultural center of urban life in Manhattan. The products were absolutely random, but I accomplished the imaginary. I froze time and saw what I wanted to see. I tried to produce the photos that I would have taken if I could defy the laws of physics and move myself about like a phantom. To accomplish this, I flipped through the random photos and cropped the photos by applying my perspective, some of the cropped material comes from just 10% of the original photo. In some instances I took just one face out of fifteen and developed a single canvas for that head. It’s difficult to defend this approach and, aside from Union Square’s urban clustering, it may be difficult to pick up a solid theme through the portfolio, but what I focused on in creating these images was the subject’s expression of thought or physiognomy.
I wanted to elicit questions from the viewer, for him to wonder what the subject was thinking. Of course there isn’t a straightforward answer, and in some cases there are several faces in a photo juxtaposed against one another. In a particular photo there are two women engaging in a conversation and a homeless person with his or her head retired upon his lap. I interpreted these two subjects as emotional polarities, and picking them out and producing them in this sort of juxtaposition was essentially what I set out to do.
All the shots were produced in black and white (or grayscale) because I felt that the color wasn’t necessary to illustrate the subject’s thoughts or expression. On the contrary, removing color creates a more reliable medium and allows the viewer to focus on the natural and human aspects in the picture, rather then getting distracted by the vibrant commercialism of New York City. I was not trying to make my photos vintage per se.
In one way, I felt that I drew inspiration from Philip-Lorca diCorcia. I took a series of candid photos but also arbitrarily imposed my reality onto the image. While diCorcia didn’t blatantly crop his photos and I didn’t exploit lighting in mine, there is a blend of his methods that influenced my style.
I did not use a specific naming system because I did not want to predispose the viewer to a particular perception. Instead I stated the obvious.

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Pigeons fly lower these days, rats scamper through the streets, and cockroaches are on subways, streets, and on buildings; yet when one actively looks for them, somehow they seem to go into hiding.  Finding pigeons was not much of an issue, and neither were squirrels if I sat at a park long enough, but squirrels were quite elusive.  I saw many interesting squirrels; one eating newly planted seeds right by a sign that said not to enter the area, one digging for food, another diving in and out of potted plants, and another that slapped a fence as a baby ogled at it.  Yet I could not capture any of these moments; they all disappeared too fast.  There was a pigeon sitting atop the edge of a bench and a woman at the other end; a squirrel climbed up and sat staring at the pigeon, but too close to the women who was startled and scared the squirrel away.

I wanted to capture “creatures,” some bit of nature that we don’t experience we live in a city.  There would be blocks upon blocks of nothing creature related: no sculptures, random art, or actual critters.  Yet creatures are not just from nature, others can create them; representation of creatures also falls under such a category of creation.  I found many more living creatures in Brooklyn and Queens than in Manhattan, yet many more representations in Manhattan.  Centuries ago, the area we know as New York City used to be one of the most biodiverse areas, and as it became industrialized and a center of commerce, the presence of animals has declined.  Then there are the animals that we would never see here like elephants and monkeys, that are interesting to see represented and how we place them.  And there are the humans (that dress up as Elmo or are some sort of green monster creation) that are our creations.

Back home in Queens, there are usually worms in bits of dirt, some ants between the concrete, and perhaps a raccoon at night digging through the trash.  Yet of all the times this has occurred, I could capture none.  There is also a stray cat prowling the streets, yet none passed when I looked for one.  Usually in subway stations, rats can be seen running around the tracks.  At the 14th Street F and M train station, there are cracks in the wall where rats can be seen sometimes scurrying quickly in and out of the holes, swerving around the people on the platforms and sometimes fat rats ambling along, seemingly drunk.  At nights, rats can be seen scampering right in front of a person walking in the street.  I positioned myself and I waited.  And the creatures never appeared.

There was a moment on the subway where there was a cockroach climbing on the window that my friend killed and another where a moth the size of a palm was scaring some people.  Yet I didn’t have a camera at the ready, and was even if I did, wouldn’t want others to think I was some strange person taking these photos.  It’s interesting how people react in front of the camera; I tried not to include them in the photos, and sometimes not so discreetly walked by and took the shot as I passed.  Many of the photos are zoomed in and cropped because of this.  Perhaps if I just pretended I were a tourist, I could’ve taken more time with each shot.  But then again, I wouldn’t know quite what I was looking for.