I Wonder Who I'm Going To Meet Today...
A Day of Fleeting Intimacy in New York's Washington Square Park
The update on my Americans book, What’s it like for you to be an American? is this: The book has been sent to 14 publishers and has been rejected twice. So for now, I simply wait.
And while I wait, I am in the midst of another promising portrait project, exploring moments of fleeting intimacy as I photograph people in and around a most eclectic piece of real estate in lower Manhattan. That is, Washington Square Park.
I have wandered through the park, alongside my intrepid assistant (and wife), Linda, for several months now, but last Sunday the photo gods seemed determined to send a wonderful array of subjects our way. I want to share a few of them with you.
Early in the day, before the park became crowded, we met Joe walking his dogs, Scout and Melania. He was wearing a New England Patriot’s jersey with the name of the 45th president on the back, and a MAGA hat on his head. I asked him if it seemed a bit awkward to be in a fairly progressive space dressed in that gear and he told me that he’s lived just a few blocks away for all of his 57 years and he simply didn’t give a damn.
Moments later, we encountered Jackson manning a table promoting the sending of aid to children in Gaza. After I photographed him and took down his contact information so that I could send him a print, I noticed that his email address contained in it the Hebrew word for “joy.” I asked him if he was Jewish, and he answered, “Yes, I am.”
There are some sections in the park where addicts can use drugs without too much hassle. We met Bethany who explained to us her drug use as a result of a brain injury suffered in a car crash. She consented to letting us make her portrait as long as we didn’t post it in a judgmental way. “Don’t say I’m homeless or unhoused,” she laughed, “Say I’m an urban camper.” She lit up a cigarette and became more serious. “There are people, and then there are human beings,” she told us. “The people are over there,” she said pointing across the park towards the fountain near the arch, “the human beings are here,” and she gestured at the folks sitting around her.
There was a time back in August when the park had dozens of artists and vendors arrayed in a ring around the central fountain area. On this day there were only a handful and so we struck up a conversation with one of them, an artist named Eric.
“A few weeks ago the cops and the park rangers just came along and enforced some rules that they never enforced before. They wiped out most of the artists and gave us just a few spaces. I have to get here like 5 o’clock in the morning to secure one of them.” Nevertheless, Eric is persevering.
A soft spoken young man with arresting eyes and tattoos across much of his face was in conversation with a woman standing nearby. When he was finished we approached. “I’m Carly,” he told us, “I’m a traveler. Yes, take my picture.”
Salma was strolling with a group of friends when Linda stopped her to ask for a portrait. (Because she is a religious Muslim woman I’m sure if I had been the one to ask she would have turned us down). She agreed and this is the lovely result.
As the sun was setting at day’s end, the park was still vibrant and alive with people. I noticed a man dressed in a fedora, a plaid sports coat and a kaffiyeh scarf draped around his shoulders. He was loudly singing into his cell phone while several young men were seated next to him, sketching on artist’s pads and seemingly oblivious to the off key voice. Chaney, seated next to him, was deeply immersed in his drawing. I asked him about the work and he showed me a portfolio of wonderfully creative images. “I want to be a cartoonist, but I keep getting turned down by publishers,” he said. “Persist,” I told him. “You’re going to get rejected and rejected and rejected until someone realizes how talented you are.” He nodded. I made his portrait, and I realized with no small irony that I also needed to heed my own advice about publishing: Persist.
