7. Paola Franqui
Taking photographs started out as a hobby for Paola during her time as a student at Rutgers. However, as she explains on her website, it soon turned into her passion, taking up more and more of her time and, eventually, leading to professional work.
Her first love, it seems, is street photography, and her work, often capturing candid moments of people going about their day, reminds us of the work of Lee Friedlander, who—famously—thought of himself as capturing “the social landscape” of cities. It is easy to put the human element of 30-floor skyscrapers out of our mind, but in Franqui’s work, they seem to retain an element of the human.
8. Black Soap
Black Soap, the moniker of a man also known as Raheim Simon, loves gritty high contrast shots, and the less than pristine elements of the cityscape, such as the incredible graffiti that’s such a big part of the city and culture of NYC. If you’re looking for wide shots that don’t look anything like what you might find at a tourist queue in Times Square, the Black Soap work might be for you.
9. Zahava Hanuka
You know those photographs that just make a city shine like magical fairy lights and snowfall in Christmas morning? Honestly, we have no idea how someone nails photos with that mood—over and over—but somehow Zahava does. One look at a city street in the rain, makes us want to go singing in the rain—to heck with the galoshes! Zahava’s work is magical, but it’s a kind of lived-in magic that we admire, one that’s truly attainable—and we’re lucky to have so lovingly captured by a photographer like Zahava.
Take another look at NYC
We’ve all seen countless photos of NYC, and yet in a city that’s so alive and ever-changing, there’s always more to take in. New York has some of the best photographers in the world, and we’re lucky that they’re constantly turning their lenses to the city around them, letting us see the city the way they do.
