Gowanus Waters

Description

The Gowanus Canal is a 1.8-mile-long waterway connecting Upper New York Bay with the formerly industrial interior of Brooklyn. Steven Hirsch grew up in the paradise of Brooklyn in the late 1940s and '50s, where he knew practically the whole borough, except for the Gowanus Canal, not witnessing it until a friend took him there in 2010. Hirsch has shot the canal surface dozens of times since that unforgettable day and the result is a series of eerily beautiful abstract photos, telling the visual story of what pollution and indifference hath wrought.

Born in Williamsburg, Brooklyn,Steven Hirschnow lives in New York's East Village. Hirsch's work has appeared in numerous publications including theNew York Times,The Wall Street Journal,The Paris Review,The New York Review of Books,Paris Match,Time,Wired,Vice,Print, The Huffington Post,The AtlanticandStern. He has taught at the International Center of Photography, The New School, Parsons School of Design, The School of Visual Arts, New York University and Pratt Institute. Hirsch has been awarded two New York Foundation for the Arts grants and his work has been widely exhibited and collected by The Museum of Modern Art, The Polaroid Collection, The Everson Museum of Art, Bibliothe que Nationale de France, Israel Museum, The Howard Stein Collection, The Library of Congress and the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center, among others.

"The Gowanus canal in Brooklyn is one of the dirtiest stretches of water in the US, contaminated by years of dumping and runoff from local industries... but Steven Hirsch has been photographing the water mixed with over a century of chemicals and waste, capturing a bizarre, abstract beauty in the pollution." --The Guardian "The images are at once haunting and oddly hypnotic, illuminating the disastrous results of unchecked contamination left out to rot, and the strange visual complexity that arises from such hazardous destruction. In the images, emerald green, metallic gold and electric aquamarine dance in abstract patterns that seem brewed from the imagination." --Huffington Post "The results are strangely mesmerizing, transforming the burbling brew from more than 150 years of industrial runoff into psychedelic abstractions. Streaks of purple mingle with neon greens and blues, while rainbow wisps swirl amid a murky darkness, like galaxies floating in space." --Hyperallergic "Even though we've probably poisoned our planet past the point of no return, the ethereality and whimsy of these images prove that every cloud has a silver lining, and every oil bubble has an opalescent gloss." --Milk "The result is an eerie pleasure in what repels most; the toxic, rank sludge bubbling and oozing from the depths of what would assuredly revolt you in person. On a hot summer day, the stench alone is sure enough to keep all but the most strident pedestrians out of its radius. Yet, Hirsch was undeterred and in this, he brought a new universe into view. Without sentimentality or righteousness, Hirsch approaches the Gowanus as an ever-changing entity, capturing what it is today without reverence or remorse. And in doing so, he allows us to look at something we never would see: the Gowanus Canal as a metaphor for New York City itself." --Crave Online As seen on: -Graphics -Co.Exist -NewsWhistle -PDN -American Photo