PDN Photo of the Day

The Old-School Grit and Romance of New York and Paris

Frank Van Riper’s award-winning career in journalism began in 1967 at the Daily News in New York. But he also has been a photographer for as long as he has been a writer and now, with the publication of his sixth book, he offers a visual memoir about two of the world’s great cities: New York and Paris.

Recovered Memory: New York and Paris 1960-1980 (Daylight Books, October 2018) is a meditation on a time and place when the pace of life was slower; before the internet and 24/7 news, and people talked to each other instead of texting on their iPhones.

In his opening text, Van Riper explains why he chose to photograph these two cities. “New York is simple: It’s what I am. I was born in Manhattan and grew up in the Bronx, just blocks from Yankee Stadium. New York is in my blood … Paris came more slowly, after two of my closest friends moved there in 1976 for what would become a nine-year stay … My visits to these New York Francophiles helped form my appreciation—and ultimately my love—of Paris …”

Van Riper’s black and white photographs, coupled with his writing, capture the mid 20th-century romance and grit of New York and Paris. The book also weighs how much has changed since these photographs were made because of rampant globalization and the birth of the Internet.

In the foreword, author Martin Walker writes that Van Riper’s photographs are “powerful, not just as triggers of memory and nostalgia of place, but of the tastes and smells and feels of another time.”

Recovered Memory: New York and Paris 1960-1980
By Frank Van Riper
Published by Daylight Books (October 2018)

Posted in:

Documentary/Photojournalism

Tags:

, , , , , ,

Comments:

Comments off

Share

Comments are closed.

Top of Page