Upward construction, downward mobility

Construction is one of those industries that will never run out of business. At any time, in whatever city you live, from a high enough rooftop, you’ll see cranes punctuating the land. They sprout from the earth like blades of metallic grass. Erecting some structure or other. Which begs the question; is a city ever finished?

Nope.

How can an ever-evolving thing stop? Especially cities that are large and diverse enough that slicing them out of existence and suspending them in a vacuum won’t make any difference. Some places sustain themselves off their own chaotic energy. Hence my terminal love affair with London.

Meanwhile across the Atlantic, as the modern American city was emerging into being, people with cameras had no choice but to document its gestation. This contradictory chronicle is the focus of Portrait of a City: A Century of American Photography currently showing at Dulwich Picture Gallery. Under a harsh July sun, I cycled to the most manicured part of South-East London with some pretty awful jazz booming in my ears. With rich, stately air filling my lungs I stepped into the exhibition and witnessed the aggressive timelapse of cities erupting into dominance.

Looking at the RCA Building at Rockefeller Centre (1949)

And what better device than the camera to document this ascendancy? The camera is a product of the same modernity that has propelled the city vertically and horizontally. Just watch Man with a Movie Camera (1929) by Dziga Vertov to get the gist. The early camera’s mechanical intricacy mirrored that of assembly line machinery, vehicles, and weaponry. Its cogs and dials and lenses spoke the language of the city. Look, for example, at Lewis Hine’s Riding the Ball High Up on Empire State (1930), depicting a wrecking ball hoisting a construction worker up in the air. The pulleys and hooks are reminiscent of the inner workings of some old camera.

New buildings were lining the skies of major American cities like NYC and Chicago in the early 1900s. A dynamic backdrop against which pioneering photographers could practice their craft. This upward construction, however, was juxtaposed against the downward mobility of communities ravaged by the Depression in the 1930s. At no point do the portraits of impoverished families or homeless people sleeping under railway arches seem condescending. People simply making do with the hand dealt them. While people were scraping cents to get by, the Chrysler and Empire State buildings were reaching up to scratch the sky. This socio-economic chasm is perhaps best represented by Louis Faurer’s Looking at the RCA Building at Rockefeller Centre (1949). The building in question looms ominously over us, its many illuminated windows resembling keyholes. Inaccessible and awe-inspiring. This reverse vertigo of staring up at skyscrapers for the first time is captured in Edward Steichen’s dizzying double-exposure of the Empire State Building (1932). Berenice Abbot expresses this accelerating verticality through her shot of Exchange Place, New York (1933). Housed in a window frame, the image itself is a tall and thin sliver of this thoroughfare, perspective hemmed-in by the neighbouring buildings. Zooming out towards the outskirts of New York, her shot from the Waterfront, South Street (1935) stares up at the city’s newly constructed skyline. The Chrysler and Empire State buildings shrouded in ghostly silhouettes.  

Waterfront, South Street (1935)

 As the USA rudely shoved its way into the position of a global superpower, ground-based shots of a city’s skyline shifted towards panoramic aerial sweeps. A grandiose widening of perspective that frames the majesty of density. Impossibly crammed jungles of roads and buildings, brownstones and boulevards, sound and colour. Expressed so musically through Nicholas Nixon’s views of Zakim Bridge, Boston (2001) and Central Park at 57^th Street (1975). The cacophonous crescendo of civilisation blares off these gliding shots. But if you look past the sunlit glitter of glassy skyscrapers, deep into the tapestry of the streets, iniquity and strife are sewn into the hem of the city. Though Aaron Siskind’s shots of Harlem gripped by targeted economic deprivement date from the 1930s, many impoverished neighbourhoods in the USA nowadays don’t look any better.  Boarded-up tenements on deserted streets remains the reality of those who’ve been most juiced by a greedy administration. Behind these stolid facades are cramped corridors with peeling plaster. Roy DeCarava’s spectral Hallway (1953) is so perfectly poorly-lit that the walls dissolve into the floor. It looks like the remaining remembered shred of a strange dream. Harlem’s vibrant sense of community vibrates off these quietly uncanny portraits - like the silence that follows a tremendous party.

Central Park at 57^th Street (1975)

Elsewhere in the city, neon signs are screaming obscene colours into the night, their hues sweeping over the glossy bodies of passing automobiles. A maddening melange of advertising promises the prospect of instant pleasure in whatever form you like. The American Dream on speed. Hypocrisy and optimism, exploitation and love, invitation and invasion, all in one flash. William Klein seizes this sensory whirlwind in Rheingold, New York (1955); a confusing convergence of reflections in a shopwindow. Neon lights, a shop sign, and a smiling dude overlap each other with no regard for perspective. I’m unsure whether I’m looking into or out of the window.

The city has exploded to such a critical mass that it’s messing with my sense of perspective. Whether it’s Ed Ruscha’s Roof Top Views (2012) of vacant lots and moribund streets or the views from Ruth Orkin’s window, I feel like I’m on the outside looking into the happenings of the city. The anti-communist paranoia that quivered through ‘50s America during McCarthy’s Red Scare threw everything into suspicion. Entire reputations were brought low by the merest suggestion of communist sympathies. This blend of uncertainty and absurdity is reflected in Garry Winogrand’s backseat shot of Park Avenue, New York (1959). You’re driving towards a tilted horizon, the Helmsley Building looming unstably over the avenue. Don’t mind the monkey in the front seat staring right at you.  

Richie (1985)

Amidst all this madness, though, tender moments are unfolding privately. Peter Hujar’s portrait of Richie (1985) invites us into one of these. Under the lonely glow of a streetlamp, a man leans against a car streaked with rain. This seems like the first moment he's had today to lose himself to his thoughts. What’s the first thought in his busy mind?

The final room of the show feels like I’ve walked into an episode of Subway Takes. Bruce Davidson’s shots of the New York subway cover every inch of this room. A constellation of vignettes from cramped, chaotic, grafitti-covered train carriages. The ‘80s are distilled through a warm, saturated colour palette. I’m reminded of being stuffed in the tube during rush hour, making eye contact with a beautiful person on the other end of the train and smiling at them. Much like the subway, it’s a democratic space that whisks around a vibrant cross-section of society. Some are indifferent to the camera while others address it with conviction. The vast and distant skyline framed for a fleeting moment through grimy windows. Crimson sunsets glowing off the tracks in the dark. A dense congregation of tombstones in a passing graveyard resembling a miniature cityscape. These scenes feel as delicately ephemeral as the prospect of ever seeing these people again.  

Subway (1986)

A city is as alive as all the people inhabiting it. It’s an organism comprised of vertexes, curves, and straight lines. Its architectural repetition is akin to some complex musical arrangement, gradually unfolding. Grand overtures through towering skyscrapers interspersed with electrified melodies from the happenings down below. Tense harmonies of the marvellous and monotonous. A city’s people collectively imbue it with a life of its own. It, in turn, communicates with us in a language we seldom understand. But every now and again, if you’re paying attention, the city calls out to you directly. It could the perfectly-timed illumination of a street lamp or the way buildings are kissed by the sun on its way down. Something about this seemingly meaningless occurrence just seems to make sense. But don’t overthink it.