New York: Capital of Photography

For street photographers, New York has always been a city of unparalleled visual excitement, teeming with diverse people and distinctive neighborhoods.

The development of street photography emerged in New York in the early 1900s — with a local school of photographers led by Alfred Stieglitz. This group focused on documenting work, loneliness, play, conflict, love and spectacle — and came to define urban perception as the characteristic visual experience of modernity.

Some photographers also became social activists, observing New York’s ethnic and racial diversity — and focusing their lenses on newcomers and marginalized groups.

From the 1930s to 1960s, members of the New York School envisioned the city in a different way — as a processing center for immigrants, a site of commercial display and a crossroads of world culture.

In the 1950s and 1960s, photographers saw New York as an uneasy battleground. Their pictures caught the forces of civil rights, sexual liberation and leftist politics as they clashed with traditional powers.

Finally, as the century waned, photographers became more self-conscious, exploring their own — and their friends’ — identities through the camera’s eye.

"New York: Capital of Photography" examines how photographers chronicled New York throughout the 20th century, how the city changed their vision — and how their work affected ideas about New York throughout the world.

The book accompanies an exhibition that was held at The Jewish Museum in New York, from April 28 to September 2, 2002 — and then at the Madison Art Center in Madison, Wisconsin from December 7, 2002 to February 16, 2003.

Presented are the works of both famous and lesser-known photographers, many of them Jewish. An underlying theme in this pictorial history of New York is the critical role played by Jewish sensibility.

About Max Kozloff