Over the last 30 years, the ubiquitous NY personality, Clayton
Patterson has documented the evolution of life in the city's Lower East
Side through it's colourful subcultures of yesterday to it's modern day
gentrification. Originally from Canada, Clayton came to NY in the late
70s to be an artist. He obviously had an immediate fascination with the
neighbourhood's melting pot of artists, junkies, the homeless and
"revolutionary minds" brewing out of the Lower East Side and began to
shoot both still an video the daily happenings of the area.
He officially made a name for himself in the late 80s when he captured
over three hours of footage during the police riots in Tompkins Square
(which ended up being used as evidence and inditing 6 cops) and
suddenly everyone from Oprah to CNN wanted a piece. His craft and in
particular his documentation of police brutality has seen him
arrested and roughed up by local law enforcement on multiple occasions.
Over the years he has amassed an enormous archive of apparently 4000
hours of 8mm and half inch film and 750,000 colour photographs of
people and events in the area.
To the right of this post is a collection of some of his images and for more information on Clayton Patterson visit
patterson.no-art.info
If you haven't seen it you should probably check out the documentary released last year his work
Captured (trailer below)