California Photography Workshops: April 2011

In 2008, with the world financial markets reeling, the Dutch photographer Reinier Gerritsen went down into the New York City subway system to try to capture the mood of commuters. He spent seven weeks documenting subway riders as they traveled between Grand Central Station and Wall Street. The resulting images speak to their anxiousness and uncertainty. Each shot is more than it appears at first glance. Rather than a single photograph, it is a construct that captures a moment, with several images of the same people taken in rapid succession and then digitally stitched together, so that most people within the image are seen in the same focus. The faces of the subjects are often filled with sadness and despair. Almost no one is smiling. “It was so depressing,” Gerritsen says. “It was the last days of Bush, and the crisis was rampant. It was a very hard time for all New Yorkers, which is very visible in the pictures.” He adds, “It was a heavy time.” — Tony Gervino - The New York Times