A Glimpse into Queens and Brooklyn

I am still moving slowly with the editing of the interview we recorded two days ago, so I will not write about that yet.

Cutting one hour of material without losing anything important is difficult — especially when nearly every story is interesting.

Yesterday was dominated by the iPhone 7 launch here.

I even tried to stream the opening ceremony of the city’s best-known Apple Store live.

Later in the morning I stopped working on the video and headed toward two other parts of New York:

First Queens.

Then Brooklyn, another seventeen kilometres away.

Getting there was easy.

I simply took the subway.

Roughly forty-five minutes later, I was already walking toward the first destination.

From now on, I think I will place even more photographs into these blog posts.

They often carry the most important information anyway.

The text is sometimes only the side dish.

Queens can be fascinating for anyone who knows New York mainly from films.

Once you leave Manhattan, the skyline changes completely.

The very tall buildings disappear.

The atmosphere becomes almost small-town in places.

You also begin to notice how different communities have their own neighbourhoods.

One street may feel strongly Chinese.

The next may feel Russian.

The urban landscape can change almost block by block.

The scenes below are fairly typical of many outer neighbourhoods.

That made Queens a very good location for a fashion series, which we finished in the early afternoon.

A lot of the houses here are wooden.

There are brick buildings too, especially among the multi-storey residential blocks.

Red and grey exposed brick is common because the material is often left visible rather than covered.

When somebody moves here to try their luck, the Bronx, Queens and Brooklyn often become the first realistic places to live.

Rent is not cheap here either.

A very small room of around six square metres might cost 600–800 dollars.

A smaller apartment in a reasonably good location can be around 1,200–2,400 dollars.

And “good location” often means one thing:

Close to the subway.

In Brooklyn, that can also mean noise.

Naturally, both better and worse options exist.

Many people share apartments with several roommates because it lowers the cost.

I mention this because I keep receiving questions by email and I want the blog to contain some practical information too.

The photographs below show streets in Brooklyn near elevated subway lines.

After the shoot, I continued toward Brooklyn.

This is where a smartphone and Google Maps become incredibly useful.

The app usually explains clearly and accurately how to reach the destination.

Still, before setting off, it is worth checking a proper subway map and seeing where you can transfer to an express service.

That can save a great deal of time.

New York effectively has two kinds of subway service on many lines.

Local trains stop at every station.

Express trains use the same route but skip many stops.

The subway map shows which services stop at each station.

That difference can save many minutes on long journeys.

I was still near the beginning of Queens.

Anyone who studies the map can see that the route toward southern Brooklyn takes you back through Manhattan.

With three subway connections and roughly an hour and a half of travel, I eventually reached Coney Island at the southern edge of Brooklyn.

In Brooklyn — and in parts of Queens too — elevated subway tracks run above the streets.

That alone is worth seeing because we do not have anything quite like it back home.

Coney Island is especially beautiful around sunset in autumn.

There is an amusement park.

The ocean.

A long pier.

And a wide sandy beach.

In summer, the area becomes extremely crowded.

Different communities tend to gather in different sections, although of course everyone can sit wherever they choose.

This is New York’s free public beach.

I tried to photograph it during a quieter period so the images could show the atmosphere without the summer crowd.

If you prefer a cleaner and calmer ocean beach, I would recommend Long Beach on Long Island.

You can reach it by a separate train.

A return trip costs around 16 dollars and takes roughly 45 minutes each way.

The beach is very clean, but unlike Coney Island it is not free.

The free beaches have their own colourful atmosphere.

Long Beach, however, can offer genuinely uncomplicated relaxation.

Before travelling, check the weather.

Because of the ocean climate, conditions can differ significantly between different parts of New York.

The photographs below are my attempt to show you a little of Long Beach.

Today I have a fashion shoot in Manhattan.

I may mention it briefly later.

But in the next posts, I would rather continue showing you the city and the preparations for the exhibition.

First, I still need to define exactly how the interview structure will work.

We continue on Monday, and from that point onward the format can no longer keep changing.

The series needs to remain consistent.

Part of the BANHALMI ecosystem

For the professional context and practical side of portrait photography, visit the BANHALMI professional website. Related art series, books and exhibitions are preserved in the BANHALMI ART archive.