Deadline driven

A few weeks ago I noticed a deadline for a photo competition that sought narratives documenting the impact of the recession on people, communities, institutions, etc. Recently, I have been spending more time trying to pick up the thread again of what's been happening in the photo world. So, when I saw this competition notice my first thought was - my office is in the epicenter of the storm ... wait... my office is in the epicenter of the storm creating the economic recession!

Almost a year ago, it was impossible to go and get my favorite salad from Flavors without tripping over the cameras set up outside of AIG. The building is right next to ours and as I passed, I always felt a twinge of sympathy for the bedraggled AIG workers as they scurried out, heads down, to get something to eat. After all, the vast majority of these folks had absolutely nothing to do with the scandal, yet they were forced, day after day to do a perp walk for coffee.

Anyway, for a few days last week I documented Wall Street - what it looks like, what it means. This is what I came up with and submitted to the competition.

PROJECT STATEMENT: Ever since that September in 2008, when complete financial collapse seemed unavoidable, contrasts between Wall Street and Main Street have been a favored narrative of pundits. This metaphor works because there exists a collective image of what Wall Street and Main Street look like and value. Main Street has the post office, the favorite coffee shop and bar, potted plants hang next to American flags. It's slower, more friendly and authentic. Wall Street is a monolithic gray edifice of financial power and might. Its skyscrapers block the daylight and its dark-suited inhabitants spin lucrative schemes.

But the actual Wall Street, the one that exists between Broadway and the East River is not like that at all. It's filled with tourists, probably from Main Street, and office workers who smoke in front of their buildings, and go out for lunch at the cart. The vestiges of its mystique are primarily evident in the people milling about the Stock Exchange and Federal Hall taking snapshot after snapshot. Without that collective reinforcement, Wall Street is just a mix of empty stores, unhealthy stressed workers, and lots of rental space on the market.

What the recession has revealed on Wall Street isn't that the Emperor has no clothes. It's that the Emperor is shabby. And tacky. And no one has the guts or desire to tell him otherwise.


Wall Street workers and tourists, outside The Trump Building, a portion of which has been empty for some months, November 16, 2009 about 2:00PM.


The Pink store, a luxury retailer of business shirts, cufflinks and ties on Wall Street, empty on November 16, 2009 about 2:00PM


Tourists pass by executive management of the company Nu Skin celebrating Investor Day outside the New York Stock Exchange on November 16, 2009 about 2:00PM.


Wall Street worker reads over document outside building on November 17, 2009 about 12:30PM


Side by side retail comparison: an empty Tumi store and a busy shoe-shine and repair shop on Wall Street, November 17, 2009 about 12:30PM


Wall Street workers line up for lunch at one of the street's many Middle Eastern lunch carts, November 17, 2009 about 12:30PM


The BMW Manhattan store on Wall Street, empty on November 17, 2009 about 12:30PM


An advertisement on the side of a phone booth by a financial services placement company aimed at financial services workers looking for a new job, on Wall Street, November 17, 2009 about 12:30PM


Wall Street's "Sad Panda" waving for tips outside of One Wall Street, November 17, 2009 about 12:00PM. The Sad Panda is a 62 year old man from Guangzhou, Chen Jialing, living in the United States for many years, who became Sad Panda after being forced to leave his former restaurant job.


Tourists pause for a picture outside the New York Stock Exchange, November 17, 2009 about 12:00PM


Pigeons scramble for crumbs on Wall Street, November 17, 2009 about 12:00PM


Street vendor sells "Wall Street Icons" - primarily money & bulls - November 17, 2009 about 12:00PM


Wall Street worker stands outside building lobby for a smoke, November 17, 2009 about 12:00PM

Northeastern Fall

I don't think I could ever tire of fall on the east coast.



Prospect Park - the view outside the living room

The November Series

I think it's probably cliche to say that you fell in love with the Yankees during the playoffs and subsequent World Series of 2001. But I can't help it, I did. I was ambivalent mostly, before then. In fact, I think I was probably pulling for the Mets the year before in the Subway Series - knee-jerk underdogism. But I was still mostly new to New York in 2001 having only lived in the city for a year and a half at that point. I had no long-standing or deep ties.

That changed in the fall of 2001. At that time my personal life was in ruins. I hated my job. No- I resented spending most of my time doing something I couldn't care less about. And every morning I took a ferry from lower Manhattan past the smoking pit of the World Trade Center directly across the river to my office building in Jersey City. Every day was a reminder of what had happened. There was no relief from collapse - whether the public tragedy and shock of 9/11 or the destruction of my own towering fantasies of marriage and love.

But for a few good weeks there were moments of escape watching the Yankees pursue the pennant. I was living in a studio apartment then. I'd go home from work to my little nest - I called it. Make some dinner. And then lie in bed, the comforter pulled in tight, fluffy pillows behind my back and watch baseball. It was a brilliant series - with extra inning games and late inning comebacks. You just kept believing that the Yankees would pull it out. That they would find a way. And they did so many times. The feeling then wasn't really one of "they have to win the Series" - it was more "please just win this game and give us another one to look foward to." And those Boys of October held on well into November.

One of my favorite writers is Roger Angell. He writes in the New Yorker, mostly about baseball. Of the best articles I ever read was "Can You Believe it?" in the November 26, 2001 New Yorker Magazine. He was able to put into perfect pitch the emotions of that Series in such a way that I shook with sobs after reading it one morning, on the ferry on my way to work.