I was working on a post earlier and will get back to it later I suppose, it features a few images I shot on the weekend of the 2012 Starbucks Run For Women at UBC last Saturday. As I was writing, and trying to collect my thoughts about what it means to see people complete their first 5 or 10 km race I found myself struggling to capture the emotion, satisfaction and exhaustion written across so many of the faces I saw that morning.
This is totally different! A link the the Atlantic’s In Focus Gallery, @In_Focus, came up in my twitter feed today with this remarkable gallery of images from the New York City Municipal Archive. Long before I considered a career in Photography, I studied history, receiving a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Victoria in 1999. I didn’t often get to sort through historical photos, but I relished any chance I got. I love seeing places I recognize in a fully different context, I love the differences and I love seeing what remains after the passage of time and human development.
What is most remarkable about this gallery are the images that also link to Google’s Street View to reveal their modern incarnations. If you love NYC, or old photos have a look and check out how these scenes appear today. I challenge you, however, when looking at these photos to consider them not as just images of our history but for the people captured in these frames, at the moment they were made, it is the apex of their modernity.
Have a look:
Elysium Photo by Rob Shaer 