Street Photography in Kensington, Philadelphia

For a long time I felt too uncomfortable to shoot honest street photography in Kensington. I had been photographed several times, pictures of me posted on social media accounts, ugly posts intended to destroy my reputation and ability to move freely and safely in the neighborhood. A couple of harm reduction groups based in Kensington were dedicated to passing very damaging lies about me, outright harassment, utilizing threatening language intended to force me out of the area. Philadelphia is a city that has long been left to its own devices, whole neighborhoods allowed to fashion their own rules and protocols that go against standards of behavior in other places. Kensington is a universe with an entirely different geography, a terrain governed by emotional outbursts, a culture of abuse that has grown and flourished, wound tightly throughout every block, felt in everyday exchanges, palpable in every way and in every moment. And so there is little accountability, and people are able to do the wrong things to each other. One can choose either acceptance or revenge. I have met some incredible people, forceful and selfless, giving time and energy, dedicated to saving those who have entirely lost hope. I wish that I could say that I have met more than a very few beautiful souls on Kensington’s streets, there only to do good, but I cannot in all honesty say that. There are a few that stand out, truly remarkable people—nurses performing wound care, everyday people bringing bagged lunches, religious groups systematically doing legitimate outreach—but the gifted are outnumbered. I have become practiced at recognizing the for profit systems and people, and prefer to remain completely disengaged moving forward.

I chose to suppress my instincts for many months. I passed by and through many scenes that told the story of Kensington, and drug use, and addiction, and neglect….and America. This American landscape, pockmarked by smoke shops and tranq wounds, discarded needles and Dunkin’ Donuts bags….an America ravaged by addiction. A hidden landscape, brutal and raw and ugly. A kind of street photography/reportage that runs totally counter to what people have come to expect and admire on social media and in news publications.

I was so disabled by the intense pressure to resist exploitation of any kind, even at the expense of important storytelling, that I lost critical opportunities to record images of destruction, desperation and life in this place in the United States of America that I will never be able to recover. Scenes that will never repeat themselves, sights that should be seen, despite the severity of the disastrous scenes on display.

Not all photographic effort in places like Kensington is effective. Some of it is outright exploitation, unbearably difficult to look at because of poor execution. Technical skills lacking, but more importantly the ability to perceive artful narrative—a critical skill—missing altogether. Where is the line? I asked myself so often that I forgot the point of being there with a camera. There is tremendously damaging cultural pressure at this time to agree with prevailing ideas, to adhere to divisive and incendiary statements or risk being othered, to remain inoffensive to all….or risk being outed, canceled, unemployed.

I found myself literally bypassing stories I wanted to tell. Missing women, a constant thread running throughout the undercurrent in Kensington. There one moment, gone the next. Sometimes placed in custody, sometimes just vanished from places they had been adhered to for months. Some images I sat on for a long time, unable to find my voice, having lost it. Sometimes I just didn’t take the picture, resigned to my silence, pressured into overlooking. Editors at major publications uneasy and unable to confront my images and what they mean….so many negative influences, working together to create a new feeling of unworthiness. I let this cultural failing seal my mouth shut, for fear of damaging my ability to have my work seen more widely. What I didn’t understand was that just by photographing what was in my heart, what I felt was truthful and compelling and non negotiable had already effectively distanced me from the mainstream editors and gatekeepers who routinely shun risk.

I witnessed situations that had to remain in memory, because pulling out a camera would have been suicidal. These images, the ones that I did not photograph with my camera, are some of my strongest and most meaningful. Some of the loneliest images in my mind are the ones of young women, ceaselessly walking the lengths of Kensington Avenue. They are vulnerable and very difficult to ethically photograph as they appear on the street.

I will never forget the woman, walking near G Street and E. Schiller Street, holding in outstretched arms what appeared to be a dead infant. Face down, wearing a light blue striped onesie, arms and legs dangled lifeless, absent any kind of muscle tension or sign of life. A tragically emaciated child that was in shockingly poor condition. As she walked, she wailed angrily at a man crossing the street in front of my car, who fearfully shouted back while trying to get as far away from her and the baby as possible. I thought about a picture….but that was a risk that I was unwilling to take on the tight, narrow one way streets that offered a slim chance of a speedy exit when the camera caused sudden chaos. That’s just one memory of an image, an image that would be tough to place even on my website if I’d been able to pull off a picture and escape with my life. I wondered how many secrets are out there in broad daylight, residing only in memory, in places like Kensington.

In the end I have come to the realization that public spaces are public. For a photographer that means that if someone is able to photograph a festival or street scene in any city in the world where photography is legal, then it’s acceptable no matter the geographical region within that legal zone. I have come to understand that Kensington is a place that must be photographed. Doing it well is a challenge that I admit I’m not always able to execute….I do my best every time. But I find that Kensington has existed outside the law for so long that photography and photographers are easily demonized because we are threatening exposure. I believe that if people are in public, and they are a part of an unfolding story of any kind, with disaster and calamity holding a deeper significance, then photography is well within the often disputed boundaries of fair practice. Many people are exploiting the neighborhood and the unusual freedom in the area to do anything at all in public, no matter how harsh, or cruel, or sad, or objectionable, or outright unlawful. How can this exploitation be somehow placed off limits to the curious? Because if I am witnessing a place that does what it pleases, when it pleases, then who is really qualified to say which exploitation is the most egregious, theirs or mine?