Scarey New Yorkers...

Subject: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 12:13 PM

Every day the Guardian gives its centre pages over entirely to some photograph or photographs - more often than not, it's not a newsworthy picture, it's just something to get us thinking or open our eyes to the world around us.

Friday they gave the pages over to a photographic series by "US conceptual artist Bill Sullivan", part of a body of work called 3Situations. It's all explained one way or another on his website 3Situations.com.

Anyway, what he did was take a whole lot of pictures of commuters pushing through a turnstile on the New York subway, and the "photographic series More Turns presents 48 of them, and that's what the Guardian gave us.

I don't know if he used all the pictures, or picked out ones that seemed to make a point. I rather hope he did, because looking at them together is really a pretty frightening sight. I don't mean they are ugly people or frightening people - but pretty well all of them look so unhappy and tense and worried.

I'm not suggesting this is just 2007, or New York. In fact I was reminded of TS Eliot's lines in The Waste Land, published in 1922:

A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
I had not thought death had undone so many.
Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,
And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.

See what you think - here is a link to the full 48 shots - click on each row and you get the pictures blown up so you can see them properly (for example, the top row).

Whatever the date, whatever the city, I don't think human beings are meant to live like this.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Alec
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 12:17 PM

True enough McGrath,& near identical pictures could have been taken in pretty much any major city on our planet.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 12:21 PM

I dunno, the last one in the first row, with the walkman on, looks pretty mellow.**bg** I don't think humans were meant to live like that, either, but I also don't think I'd look too happy getting caught off-guard by an unknown photographer when I was hurrying to get somewhere, too.

How about changing the thread name to something a little less accusatory, "tense" instead of "Scarey?"

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 12:32 PM

I don't think they're frightening at all Kevin. Maybe you haven't ridden the subway to know that when millions of people a day travel through this huge commuter network they don't have on the same expressions as they would if they were entering a museum or a restaurant or even their workplaces. The subway is an efficient place, where you try to pay attention to any risks that might confront you, but mostly you just go about your business.

I'm impressed with how efficiently each of them manages the things they're carrying and the metro card. Twenty years ago you'd see them dropping a token into a slot and moving forward. Now they usually have cards with several rides paid for, so wallets are involved. A lot of these folks look like they're going to work. I think you're reading too much into expressions in a place where one doesn't generally interact with other people, they're intent with their race to catch the train.

SRS

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 12:34 PM

Well , my post tries to make it pretty clear that it's the very tenseness that is scarey, not the fact that they are New Yorkers. You codl get similar pictures in London, I'm sure - though our tube turnstiles aren't quite so much like execution machines.

My initial assumption on seeing these was that "getting caught off-guard by an unknown photographer when I was hurrying to get somewhere, too" might explain the looks.

But the photographer swears he made a point of trying to avoid that: At the moment that the subjects passed through the turnstile, unknown to them, I took their picture stationed at a distance of eleven feet. I stood there turning pages of a magazine observing subjects out of the corner of my eye, waiting for only the moment when they pushed the turnstile bar to release the shutter. (From this explanatory page.)

The lad with the headphones does look mellow, I agree. But that just brings out how maybe that's the only way to survive in the modern city, - as Timothy Leary put it in a slightly different context "drop out, turn on, tune in".

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 05:26 PM

I suppose this thread really ought to be in the BS section. Unless maybe someone wants to drift it on to songs about being isolated in the big City, such as Ralph McTell's Streets of London, or Enda Kenny's The Barman Says (that's Enda Kenny the song writer in Australia, not the Dublin politico).

I've been looking at the other two sections in the site, the one with pictures of people in an elevator (a lift), StopDown, and sitting on a bench in Times Square Time Port

Once again I find it frightening how sad and apprehensive almost everybody seems to look. Even the ones sitting in Times Square. I hope it's just a front they out on, a sort of shield against contact in a place that's too full of strangers.

Yes, Stilly River Sage, I know about travelling around on the London Underground, and how people keep themselves to themselves. I lived in London for years and grew up there. Maybe it hadn't hit home to me how bad it's got, city life. But those pictures I find pretty disturbing.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 06:39 PM

The thought strikes me about how we look when we retreat within ourselves. The facade may be totally deceiving.

I'm thinking of a music party of one kind or another. Have you looked at the photos of the Mudcat Getaway? Surrounded by and steeped in music has to be one of the happiest times one could have. BUT did you notice how many people in those photos look bored, sleepy, grumpy? Inside, we may be smiley-happy but you'd never guess it from the outside.

Maybe it's kind of like that on a subway or a city street. We forget our faces on the outside, and live INside.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 06:50 PM

McGrath-

You should see these New Yorkers when they're in a feeding frenzy; that's really scary!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble, safe in Maine

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 07:31 PM

I know what you mean Ebbie - but I'm not sure that example is too good, The Mudcatters in this bunch of Getaway Photos from 2004, taken at random, may look a rum lot at times, but they mostly look pretty engaged and frequently cheerful. As for this bunch, words fail me...

But I see a difference between people looking disengaged and withdrawn in a crowded place, for example, and looking frightened and tens. Here's a bunch of photos on flickr from the London Tube - mostly disengaged and withdrawn, it seems to me.

Actually, I think there's a lot to be said for consciously making a decision to look reasonably cheerful and at ease in public places like that. Even aside from it possibly lightening the mood for fellow passengers, our own internal moods can be modified by the way we use our face muscles. We generally think of it the other way rouind, but it works both ways.

Look miserable and you tend to feel miserable, look cheerful and you tend to feel more cheerful. Within limits, obviously.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: dianavan
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 07:58 PM

I have to agree, McGrath. We don't have a subway in Vancouver, its a skytrain, but the passengers are mostly self-contained and detached rather than fried.

The New Yorkers look burnt-out. Its the bags under their eyes and the dishevelled clothing that really makes them look stressed. There were only six or seven who look like they know how to relax. How about the guy with his tongue hanging out? I hope he isn't in a position of power. Scary is right!

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: GUEST,ozchick
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 08:02 PM

I went to London last year for a holiday and used the Tube all the time cos its a great way to get around, but i can tell you if someone had taken my photo, my face would have looked very scared - because i WAS!!! Scared that I was on the wrong train, scared that i'd miss my stop, scared that someone would blow up the train.... All in all it was a GREAT experience, and i'd go back tomorrow!

What i'd like to know is what permission did this guy have to take these shots? If the people didn't know he even had a camera... did he approach them after taking the photo, or do they not realise that people all over the world are now looking at pictures of them?

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: SINSULL
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 10:13 PM

They look more weary than scary to me but I spent many years sharing those turnstiles with similar people. We juggled our wallets and tokens and coffee cups and whatever else we were carrying, sweated or froze in poorly maintained cars and prayed that no one would have a heart attack on the train because the boss didn't want to hear it. All he knew was that you were late.

People are not meant to live like that. But there was a time when I thrived on it. Go figure.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 10:28 PM

The question still remains of whether the photographer was choosing to exhibit only the faces that struck him as particularly grim or whether these pictures are representative ...

I think my face would fit in well with those of the New Yorkers going through the turnstile, on a typical morning when I'm heading into work ...

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 10:31 PM

Actually you can engage New Yorkers on the subways in conversation. Barry Finn and I were very successful in that last spring. Of course, the folks we were talking to turned out to be recent emmigrants from northern New England, but we didn't know. And then it turned out that the people across from us were from Vermont. In fact no one in the whole damn car was from New York!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble, who has relatives alive and well in Brooklyn

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: GUEST,hoot&fidget
Date: 03 Feb 07 - 10:36 PM

You'd get exactly the same expressions on people riding Washington, DC's Metro and I expect for exactly the same reasons. That being said, it's good to have the mirror held up to us. I also agree with "McGrath of Harlow" that this could have been 1922.

The first thing this reminded me of was Dorothea Lange's photo "Migrant Mother" of Florence Owens Thompson in March, 1936.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 03:36 AM

My initial assumption on seeing these was that "getting caught off-guard by an unknown photographer when I was hurrying to get somewhere, too" might explain the looks.

But the photographer swears he made a point of trying to avoid that: At the moment that the subjects passed through the turnstile, unknown to them, I took their picture stationed at a distance of eleven feet. I stood there turning pages of a magazine observing subjects out of the corner of my eye, waiting for only the moment when they pushed the turnstile bar to release the shutter.

Most of the people are looking straight into the camera, so it seems that the photographer was not as unknown as he thought he was.

They had every reason to be suspicious of someone invading their privacy in such an underhand way and perhaps their faces reflect this. I think it shows the great tolerance of New Yorkers that he didn't get a poke in the eye.


DC

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: gnomad
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 07:49 AM

I think he has made a selection, the dates below the pictures suggest this, also the consistently dead expressions. My initial thought was that the photographer must be a scary-looking guy, but if the subjects of the photos were caught unawares then that would not apply.

Most mass transit systems are handling a bunch of people who are simply getting through a dull and routine part of their day, they just want it done with so that "real" life can proceed. The passengers are in an unnatural space, usually confined more closely than is comfortable with a random selection of strangers, any of whom might well be a threat, they are frequently tired and/or stressed and [at least in the UK] they are probably being overcharged for the privilege.

No wonder they don't look their best.

Getting out of commuting was one of my best-ever decisions.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Ron Davies
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 09:42 AM

What time of day were the pictures taken? If it's early in the morning, that may be a reason so many look stunned. If they're going to work, maybe they're not enthusiastic about that. They may just not like the photographer to be in their way when they're trying to get off the train--which he may be.

I take the subway in the morning in DC and I'm always trying to read as much of my paper as I possibly can before getting to the office. And I virtually always find a long article I'm really interested in reading. So I'm probably pretty oblivious to most of the world--aside from trying not to get hit while crossing (at the crosswalk!).


I think you can read too much into these photos.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: Ron Davies
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 09:46 AM

Actually, I whip through the free paper (put out by the Post) then I start reading my own paper. So I'm definitely preoccupied.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 10:09 AM

I love how people will read what they want into situations. With all due respect McGrath, it appears you (and others) have a preconceived notion about New Yorkers and city dwellers. "Execution machines"? " I don't think human beings are meant to live like this"? Who are we to be the judge and jury?

I would bet if this photographer took pictures in your local pub, or a getaway sing, or any festival - he would have a gruesome collection of yokels that are well past their prime and should be put out to pasture. At least that is the impression that someone who loves living a bustling city experience might have.

People tend to have perception that their way of living is the only way. They automatically assign words like "tense" and "stress" to city life or "bored" and "lathargic" to rural life. It is just a form of stereotyping.

The nice thing about photography is that it captures a moment in time and the viewer can make assumptions. Too often those assumptions are based on what the viewer WANTS to see.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 02:19 PM

"Execution machines" - well that's what they look like to me. Hi-tech guillotines. They could have been designed to scare people, make them feel like they are in between the cogs of a machine, like Chaplin in City Lights.

Cities can be pretty good, and they can be pretty bad. I'm a Londoner, born there, grew up there, worked there for years. At times I miss living there still, and I get up to town often enough.

And I think the key to not getting ground down in the rush and the crowds of a big city is to resist giving in to the temptation to get all tense and hostile. In the words Rabbi Lionel Blue often says in his radio chats "Don't take it so heavy."   And I think that's something city dwellers have managed to do for the most part over the ages, and its been reflected in the humour of cities.

But the thing about those pictures was the way it suggested that, for a lot of people, that may be breaking down. I hope it's not true, and that that collection of pictures is essentially an artefact.

And the best of luck to all the Mudcatters who are living in big cities, and not allowing themselves to get ground down, or to grind down other people, by looking all suspicious and hostile in their direction.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 04:11 PM

So people who live in small towns and rural areas do not look suspicious and hostile?

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: autolycus
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 04:44 PM

Look those people are living in the greatest (and therefore happiest) city in the greatest (and therefore happiest) city in the world,and we'd all be down the plughole without them.

   We should be copying them, because they are the ones who are getting it right,and if we don't look like that,then more fool us for not hittting the very apex of human achievement in all history. This is what's over the rainbow. They unlike me are living the dream.

So stop knocking these peoiple who are making all our goodies - er - good. I mean possible. This is what technology,wars,money,stuff,progress,get-up-and-go,advertising,education,education,education lead to.

Don't forget,whoever has the most stuff when they die,WINS.






       Ivor

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 04:47 PM

"Look those people are living in the greatest (and therefore happiest) city in the greatest (and therefore happiest) city in the world,and we'd all be down the plughole without them."

You forgot - "the greatest (and therefore, etc.) country in the world".

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: able
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 05:51 PM

I haven't been to New York in years, memories are people passed out in doorways 2 blocks off of Times Square, cab drivers at Times Square who couldn't find the major airports, cab drivers at the major air ports that couldn't find Times square. The general fatigue of everything including our hotel, stripped cars, the man assiduously mowing his 3 foot wide lawn. A talk show in Toronto when a woman called in to say that if they could build the black box to survive an air crash, then why couldn't they build the whole plane that way. (100 million tons?) People who live in cities to remain anonymous usually should live in cities. They have my sympathy and confusion. In New York we stopped in at a delli and I asked the man who served us how can you people live like this. His reply, if you don't know any better it's alright, and that's when I wanted to shove his sleeve up to see if there was a serial number tatooed on the inside of his forearm, because he spoke with the accent of the Jews that you see in the movies. Perhaps, we are as weird as them from their standpoint, I CAN hope that we aren't.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 06:59 PM

"Perhaps, we are as weird as them from their standpoint"

My guess is that you are weirder. I doubt if the deli man was passing judgement on you by your appearance and voice. Most New Yorkers and "city dwellers" are used to all walks of life and conditions.

Stripped cars? I've been to rural parts of the country where it is common to see washing machines on the front porch and a stripped car in the driveway.

I assume you were also amazed by the tall buildings?

It amazes me that supposedly intelligent people can have such narrow views of the world and make judgements about the human condition, when it is obvious that they have not been out in the real world.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: GUEST,LilyFestre
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 07:34 PM

Having worked as an assistant photography editor for a daily paper, I have plenty of experience taking photos that were simply fillers. It can be difficult to catch people who are completely unaware that you are standing there with your camera and gear. I think it would be highly unlikely that a photographer standing only 11 feet away, clearly standing head on with the folks going through the turnstyles would be hard to miss. That doesn't scream "BLEND" to me, does it to you?

In any case, I find the photos interesting, not just the expressions, but the clothes and especially what each passenger is carrying and how it is being carried....the various ages...all of it. I wonder where each of them is going, where they are coming from, how did they start their day, etc. I could look and daydream about each of those photos for hours imagining those kinds of things.

Thanks for sharing the site.

Michelle

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 07:35 PM

I think it's pretty natural to recognise when people don't look happy, and an awful lot of those people really do look unhappy. Not just bored or withdrawn.

Made me think of Stevie Smith's:

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

I suspect (and hope) that "conceptual artist Bill Sullivan" might have slected the pictures and maybe manipulated the shots (eg made sure there was something alarming to confront the commuters as they squeezed through that trap). If that really is a random bunch of people in a situation that hasn't been set up to upset them, I do find that a bit unnerving.

I'm not knocking cities as such. Cities have always been exciting places, and fun places, and the places where some (probably most) of the best things produced by human beings have been produced. But cities can go badly wrong sometimes. A book I've always admired which talks about stuff like that is Jane Jacobs' classic The Death and Life of Great American Cities.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 07:41 PM

And I agree with Michelle on finding the details of the people fascinating in themselves, aside from the stuff about their expressions and body language.

Imagine having a set of pictures like that from, say Elizabethan times, or Ancient Rome. I can imagine people in a thousand years poring over these.

Or think of the stories you could make up looking at them.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 07:41 PM

If I put together a collection of photographs showing people laughing and smiling, would you then draw conclusions that city folks are always having parties and thinking only of good times?

The photos in question are one artists interpretation. It was not a scientific survey of the city and to make assumptions is wrong.   Cities do go badly wrong sometimes. So do rural communities. You are dead wrong if you make assumptions based on where people live.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 07:46 PM

No assumptions made, Ron. I said "If that really is a random bunch of people in a situation that hasn't been set up to upset them". That "really" implied some doubt as to whether that was the case.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 07:54 PM

Sorry, I did not see the word if in front of "cities can go badly wrong sometimes". Maybe it is my computer.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 08:04 PM

"Cities do go badly wrong sometimes."

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 04 Feb 07 - 08:11 PM

I guess I was wrong. I can see where "cities do go badly wrong sometimes" implies more doubt.

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Feb 07 - 06:05 PM

Your words, Ron...

Subject: RE: Scarey New Yorkers...
From: able
Date: 06 Feb 07 - 05:08 AM

Ron, I wasn't trying to make judgements, these were observations. Stripped cars along the travelled portion of the road is a strange thing for me to see. The gentleman and the serial number was in my belief indicative of my belief that he had been in places far worse. A different person than myself might think you are entirely too defensive, you will notice, I didn't make a personal attack.