70’S NEW YORK SUBWAY
We are all familiar with the dark side of New York City in the ’70s ’80s, the subway is frightful looking. It has paint and signatures all over its aged face. It has been vandalized from end to end. It smells so hideous you want to put a clothespin on your nose, and it is so noisy the sound actually hurts.
This image series will be reminiscing the beauty of the New York subway in the ’70s. The idea is to experience the journey taking the NYC subway during the night when all the possibilities might happen anytime. From the sound of the train coming right in your face, romancing couple in the corner of the train, eccentric old ladies talking to strangers, graffiti artist tagging his signature everywhere, variety of people from all across the globe, and many more sparks that you wouldn’t expect them appears during the ride.
To create the experience stronger, my zine cover was inspired by New York Subway (MTA) signage. The dots with a letter on each dot that symbolize the platform and direction is really iconic. In order to represent this black and white image series, I created the dots in grayscale color-tone. With the line at the bottom sign added simply to represent the destruction and the street art culture that happening intensely during the 70’s New York era. Not only that, I’m using the same font as the New York Subway signage which is Helvetica. Helvetica is the official typeface of the MTA today. All the pictures were in black and white and all the pictures were taken by analog cameras. They came from different resources, but interestingly they perfectly stitched to create one storyline.
Melbourne, Australia
2020
