BROOKLYN STREET ART LOVES YOU MORE EVERY DAY
Geoff Hargadon is a photographer and periodic contributor to BSA who takes his shots from the perspective of an artist, collector, and unabashed fan of the Street Art scene. Affable and engaged with his surroundings, Hargadon’s wizened perspective is often looking for something that says more than what it appears to and in the process can be revelatory.
Wynwood Arts District/Art Basel. Miami 2013. (photo © Geoff Hargadon)
Girl on a Skateboard, An Avatar in Wynwood 2013
~Geoff Hargadon
With 400 million photos a day being uploaded to Facebook and Instagram alone, it gets harder and harder to shoot photos that stand above the crowd. I think this is no different in the street art world – maybe it’s even harder. This year I shot fewer street art photos than in years past because I don’t see much sense in capturing work that’s already been captured well by others. There is little to add. Instead I’ve been patiently waiting to document moments that come to me – it could be a random person entering the frame, a shift in the light, a changing composition. In this digital world, where others rush to be the first to capture and post something new, and where time is their enemy, I try to put time on my side.
Let me start with what I think is wrong about this photograph, shot in Miami on December 6, 2013, at 1:20am on NW 2nd Ave, between 24th and 25th: it’s dark, out of focus, the subject is not facing the camera, and, perhaps to the great disappointment of BSA readers, there is no art in the frame.
This is what I think is right about this photograph: it’s dark, out of focus, the subject is not facing the camera, and there is art happening all around the frame, very much responsible for creating the scene itself.
There are only a few of nights out of the year when Wynwood is this chaotic, and at this time of the year it’s because of the massive art scene happening around the art fairs. All of this helped to create the moment when I spotted this girl weaving her skateboard freely between taxis that were hopelessly motionless. She seems carefree, risky, happy, ethereal – many of the things that have drawn me to street art in the first place. She is an Art Basel Miami avatar.
(Further, taxis are so scarce in Miami that I challenge anyone to come up with a photo of four of them in a single frame.)
Location: Wynwood District, Miami. 2013
#13from2013
Check out our Brooklyn Street Art 2013 Images of the Year by Jaime Rojo here.
<<>>><><<>BSA<<>>><<<>><><BSA<<>>><><<>BSA<<>>><<<>><><BSA
Please note: All content including images and text are © BrooklynStreetArt.com, unless otherwise noted. We like sharing BSA content for non-commercial purposes as long as you credit the photographer(s) and BSA, include a link to the original article URL and do not remove the photographer’s name from the .jpg file. Otherwise, please refrain from re-posting. Thanks!
<<>>><><<>BSA<<>>><<<>><><BSA<<>>><><<>BSA<<>>><<<>><><BSA
238
138
45
Other Articles You May Like from BSA:
Optically entertaining Street Artists Dalek and Buff Monster don’t typically work together and are known for uniquely different approaches although their new “Spaced Out” double-solo show at GR Galler...
Wandering along a footpath under the elevated street in Beijing these days you are likely to find the same sort of graffiti tags, wildstyle burners and stenciled celebrities that you discover in so-ca...
“He wanted to highlight youth, its beauty and diversity,” says Gautier Jordain about French stencil master Jef Aérosol for this new public mural he just completed in Evry, in the south of Paris. Je...
While New York has always been a melting pot of cultures and languages and people from all over the world, it’s also a fundamental responsibility to also keep our eyes and ears on the folks who are “...
After Covid kept us all away from this exhibition, BSA and Martha finally got a chance to see her retrospective in person, rather than through virtual 3-D tours or videos and photos. Here she is at a...
