Some photographers travel to the other end of the world to find suitable motifs – Carrie Boretz discovers them right on their own doorstep. She has been portraying people on the streets of New York for over 40 years. Your illustrated book “STREET: New York City – 70s, 80s, 90s” now shows a selection of around a hundred black and white photographs, taken from the mid-seventies to the nineties.
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For years Boretz documented street life in the metropolis for various newspapers and magazines. One day when she was looking at her old scans and negatives, she came up with the idea for the project and deliberately only selected photos up to the 1990s. “Some of the pictures were published during the time I was taking them. But now they have gotten stronger and make you think more,” said the photographer to SPIEGEL ONLINE.
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Her illustrated book covers different neighborhoods and districts: from Brooklyn to Queens, from Manhattan to Harlem. Boretz was particularly interested in the small moments in everyday life, more than the major events, the political or social unrest of the time.
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She did not specifically look for specific motifs, they are chance encounters and incidents. Her photos are determined by the people she saw: a man and a woman are dancing in a nightclub, she throws her head back ecstatically. A cardboard sign hangs on a telephone booth, it says “Out of order”, a man speaks into the receiver anyway. A young woman is playing Pac-Man while her young child is sitting on the table.
The photographs show Boretz’s personal view of the city: there are scenes and characters that make their own heart beat faster – “I can’t help it, I see pictures all the time”. At the same time, the illustrated book gives an insight into fashion, cars, hairstyles and clothing of the past. They show a New York that no longer exists today.
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New York has changed a lot since then, says the photographer: The city is much cleaner today than it used to be, and many older buildings have disappeared. “People who lived in the same apartments for decades were forced to leave because rents became more expensive.” But she especially notices that people used to be much more in contact with one another: “Back then, nobody stared at their cell phones,” says Boretz.
She still takes photos on the streets of New York, but no longer professionally, but only in her free time. And Carrie Boretz has now exchanged her old SLR camera for a new smartphone.
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