NY Through the Lens - New York City Photography

New York City night. Rain. Bryant Park. Midtown.

—-

Through eyelashes wet with rain,

a thousand thoughts fall

to the ground

and through the raindrops

the city lights blur together

as shadows make their way

into the night -

impermanence

registered with

every blink.

—-

View this photo with a comment thread on my Google Plus page

—-

View “New York City - Rain and Wet Sidewalks” in my photography portfolio here, email me, or ask for help.

New York rain. Romance on Doyers Street. Chinatown.

Stolen moments are the sweetest moments.

When the rest of the city has escaped for the day, the world melts away with a lingering kiss under an umbrella.

—-

It’s really no secret that Doyers Street is one of my favorite streets in lower Manhattan. It’s an alley (or very narrow street) that is usually photographed from an entirely different angle. In fact, the fact that it has a sharp angle in it goes along with its colorful history. Its angle was known as “the Bloody Angle” for part of the 20th century due to gang violence.

This is just around the bend from the more popular part of the angle and also across from one of my favorite noodle shops in Chinatown. I love moments like this that are so completely candid but somehow feel cinematic. I had just walked out from the above-mentioned noodle shop when I was met with this scene. It was too perfect to not quickly capture, of course.

To all who celebrate Valentine’s Day and to all who do not celebrate - I wish you romantic moments like this one. ♥

—-

Taken with the Sony A55.

—-

View this photo with a comment thread on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “Stolen Moments - Chinatown - New York City” Posters and Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

New York City in the rain. Flatiron District, Midtown.

There is an inherent romance that buzzes through the air in New York City when it rains.

The Flatiron District is one of my favorite areas in Manhattan when it rains. The street (5th Avenue) opens up to reveal distant skyscrapers that disappear into heavy fog as people weave their way through the multitudes of umbrellas.

The clock in this image is the Fifth Avenue Building Clock (a close-up image and its history is in this post) which is a New York City landmark and recalls another era: one where these ornamental clocks played a role in attracting people to gilded era storefronts. This vantage point is with the Flatiron Building directly in back of the viewer looking up 5th Avenue.

—-

I have had quite a few requests that I add some of my New York City mobile photography to my online store and portfolio since people are looking to buy holiday gifts. This is the first of one of those requests. It was taken with my phone and has been lovingly added (link below!).

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “New York City - Rain” Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

Rain. New York City. Greenwich Village.

When the sky opens up over the city, urban wanderers glide over the surface of streets slick with shadowy memory.

And every drop of rain holds the world in its slippery grasp.

—-

Recently, someone who saw this same photo in black and white inquired if I also had the image available in color. Since I shoot in color and convert my color photos to black and white after the fact (with a few exceptions), I went through my library and found my color rendition of this scene. I was struck with how the photo evoked a different set of emotions when viewing it in color. I have come to love it in black and white to such an extent that my memory of the scene as it occurred also plays out in my mind in black and white. However, I remember the initial appeal of this candid moment was the strong bursts of color against the winter-bare trees. The day was bitterly cold: the type of damp cold that seeps down to the bone and in one short moment, the street erupted with color. It was such a fleeting moment but it created such a spark.

On a related note, I read an interesting essay by Joel Meyerwitz a few days ago on the New York Times Lens Blog called A Question of Colors - Answered. Meyerwitz is part of a current exhibition in London which compares some of Henri Cartier-Bresson’s black and white images with work by other noted photographers who have been influenced by him but have chosen to work in color for a large part of their photography careers. The curator of this particular exhibition states that: “This exhibition will show how Henri Cartier-Bresson, in spite of his skeptical attitude regarding the artistic value of colour photography, nevertheless exerted a powerful influence over photographers who took up the new medium and who were determined to put a personal stamp on it. In effect, his criticisms of colour spurred on a new generation, determined to overcome the obstacles and prove him wrong.”

It’s interesting to me that color photography inhabits a more defensive realm than black and white photography especially when it comes to street photography. I think that both have different psychological effects on the viewer and both can be just as valid in terms of having artistic value. However, it’s definitely not a simple debate.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “Rain - New York City - Greenwich Village - Washington Square” Posters and Prints here, View my store, email me, or ask for help.

Rain. Greenwich Village, New York City.

Rain is the sky’s love song to the city.

The sky opens up revealing an other-worldly light that cloaks the city in effervescent splendor.

Sidewalks and streets, slick with promise, mirror the movement of urban explorers navigating the sleek concrete as taxi lights shine their refracted, blurred lights into the vast expanse of the rain-soaked landscape.

—-

Sharing this photo today since I talked about it (briefly) and a few other photos of mine on Trey Ratcliff’s Stuck in Customs Show last night. Trey was traveling and I was asked last minute if I would be on the show with a few other street photographers to discuss some of our work. It was a great time! The other photographers on the show were Eric Kim and Rinzi Ruiz and it was hosted by Karen Hutton and Dave Veffer. I am already a huge fan of Eric’s street photography but I wasn’t familiar with Rinzi’s work and it completely blew me away.

While the majority of my work tends to focus on New York City’s landscapes and architecture and is devoid of people, it was nice to discuss a few of my photos that do have people in them and talk a little bit about my philosophy on shooting people in the city and the narratives I tend to gravitate towards when dealing with people shots.

It’s always interesting to see how certain themes emerge with any art form and I seem to have a fondness for street photography in the rain. I blame New York City for that fondness. It’s just so incredibly moody and beautiful when it rains here :).

You can view the show from last night here: Trey’s Variety Hour #53: Street Photography

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “Rain - Greenwich Village - New York City” Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

Rain in the afternoon. Flatiron District. Midtown, New York City.

As rain falls onto the city’s buildings, a sea of umbrellas washes up to sidewalk shores as streets glisten with light and promise.

—-

This photo was taken with my phone. I am @newyorklens on Instagram (view my feed here). Check out my other Instagram posts made to this blog here. You can check out all of my Instagram photos on Flickr here. Additionally, you can view my phone photography for sale here.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “Rain - Flatiron District - New York City” Prints here, My mobile photography for sale here, My regular photography for sale here, email me, or ask for help.

Rain. Pell Street. Chinatown, New York City.

In-between light creates all its own stories. It’s the light after a long night when the city sleepily shakes off the blanket of darkness and stretches in the first few rays of the waking sun and it’s also the light after a long day when the city unwinds basking in the low light of dusk.

In-between light caught in the steady drizzle of rain is even more enchanting. Tears of laughter, heartache, sorrow and joy fall on the city streets silencing their hungry rumble. Buildings darken one by one as the city blurs softly preparing for its nightly refractory period.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “Rain on Pell Street - Chinatown - New York City” Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

Doyers Street on a rainy summer afternoon. Chinatown, New York City.

When the sky seduces the city with its tears of happiness, the streets swoon illuminated by the glow of nearby lights.

Broken-hearted alleys fill up: lovers with empty recesses in their hearts soak in the warm afterglow of what the sky has wrought.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “The Seduction of the Sky - Doyers Street - Chinatown - New York City” Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

Chinatown on a rainy evening. New York City.

I used to imagine that I could stop time in tiny increments by blinking my eyes. Each blink had the potential to open up an entirely new narrative and universe. It wasn’t until I fell in love with photography that I realized that every photo also opens up an entirely new narrative and universe of possibility.

On evenings when rain washes over the city each moment becomes a solitary frame broken ever so slightly by the movement of umbrellas, the blink of an eye and the click of a camera.

—-

If you didn’t see my initial contest entry post for the current Artists Wanted photography contest, you can still help me out by going to my contest entry page and clicking collect me

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “The Gleam in the Eye of the Clouds - Chinatown - New York City” Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

Rainy day. Greenwich Village, New York City.

Every drop of rain paints the city with an otherworldly light: tiny illuminated universes cast their glow onto the city with every luminous splatter.

Wet earth in the form of darkened concrete springs forth new life in the form of urban wanderers who migrate quickly from one patch of earth to another as their wet reflections echo their movements.

And after the day has unleashed its deluge of light, the city soaks in the infused-afterglow.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “Infused Afterglow - Rain - Greenwich Village - New York City” Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

Rain in Greenwich Village, New York City.

In dreams memories take on the hues of nostalgia: faded hues made rich with meaning that are etched into the dreamscapes that play themselves against our eyelids each night.

Memory-tones diffused by the tear-in-the eye and lump-in-the throat feeling of familiarity synthesize with overwhelming feelings of connection with the past as it dilutes itself into the present.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “The Color of Rain - Greenwich Village - New York City” Posters and Prints here, email me, or ask for help.

Rainy Doyers street in Chinatown. New York City.

When the sky seduces the city with its tears of happiness, the streets swoon illuminated by the glow of nearby lights.

Broken-hearted alleys fill up: lovers with empty recesses in their hearts soak in the warm afterglow of what the sky has wrought.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “The Seduction of the Sky - Doyers Street - Chinatown - NYC” Posters and Prints here, View my store, email me, or ask for help.

Pell Street, Chinatown in the rain. New York City.

Under the weight of the sky’s tears streets glisten reflecting the gleam in the eye of the clouds overhead. The day washes away slowly: its sorrows and joys melt into puddles under-foot.

It’s on these sorts of evenings that all of the cares in the world pale in comparison to the momentary haze that engulfs the city: a sultry, sorrowful, sedate embrace.

—-

View this photo larger and on black on my Google Plus page

—-

Buy “The Gleam in the Eye of the Clouds - Chinatown - New York City” Posters and Prints here, View my store, email me, or ask for help.

Chinatown in the rain. New York City.

There is nothing like a rainy evening in New York City. The streets, darkened by the rainfall take on a beautiful sheen against the glistening walls and storefronts. Couples huddle under shared umbrellas and inviting scents of dinner fill the streets.

It’s been exceptionally rainy in New York City for the past week or so. It’s as if the city is quenching its thirst after the long hot marathon that was the summer. I am hoping that eventually this rain will stop and give way to beautiful autumn weather. But in the meantime, it is admittedly hard not to love the sheer romance of a rainy evening in New York City.

—-

—-

Buy “Chinatown in the Rain” Prints and Posters here, View my store, email me, or ask for help.