I started photographing New York City during my studies at Pratt Institute. Recently I have been focusing on Brooklyn including my current project to document Fulton Street. The scope of this project is documenting the street from Franklin Avenue to Boerum Place in downtown Brooklyn. Fulton Street is a commercial street in flux. It is evolving in several ways. Starting at Franklin Street, the shops and restaurants are small. Many of them are in older buildings that in many cases have been renovated and often feature bright paint and eye catching graphics. There are a few new taller residential buildings like the Sax building with its saxophone mural. Walking toward downtown, the buildings become larger. From Lafayette Avenue onward, there are a collection of new high rises housing residences and offices on the higher floors. Still there are older buildings with independent shops and eateries. Crossing Flatbush Avenue, even taller high rises are springing up like plants including Brooklyn’s super tall, The Brooklyn Tower. The Fulton Street Mall houses larger stores including wig and clothing stores, sporting goods, jewelry, pizza, ice cream concessions and lots of street vendors. There are also empty stores, tear downs, and new construction in progress. Gage & Tollner has restored its restaurant near Boerum Place, but is currently surrounded by boarded up spaces. It’s a remarkable building and eatery. I hope the future surroundings do it justice.
This is an ongoing project. Change seems to be speeding up. The Electric Lotus Tattoo shop has already closed and its space is for rent.
The Distressed Cities in America project in this site’s Photography Archive emphasizes ways of thinking about economic problems, urban renewal, and redevelopment in cities across the country. Brought on urban flight, industry changes, and mismanagement, many cities have experienced deindustrialization, and economic difficulties. There are blighted areas in places that on the surface are thriving. Several cities included in the project have declared bankruptcy. Detroit is one those that is redeveloping parts of the city while other neighborhoods remain devastated. When photographing, I am asked, “Are you from the gas or electric company, or the tax office? Are you thinking of buying this building? Is the city going to tear this building down?”
Just as the distressed cities are evolving so are Brooklyn and Fulton Street. I plan to continue documenting the changes.
Sally Tosti holds two Master of Fine Art degrees. Her most recent MFA is in Photography and Printmaking from Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY. Sally also holds an MFA in Drawing and Painting from Marywood College, Scranton, PA. Sally’s artist book, Go West, is in the collection of the Center for Book Arts NYC. Her book, Opportunity Detroit,is included in collection of the University of California Berkeley. Her Detroit books are also in the collections of the University of Virginia and Stanford University. Her fourth Detroit book was included in Aperture’s Delirious Cities exhibition. Sally’s artist book Haight Pipe Dreams was shown at the Book as Art v.4: Boundless, Decatur Arts Alliance, Decatur, GA. Sally was an exhibitor at Codex IV, Codex V and Codex VI in Berkeley and Richmond, CA .