And the beat goes on...

I started to think about LaToya Ruby Frazier's work on her city in Pennsylvania. I LOVED that work. In it she had newspaper articles and I thought of incorporating some of those into my work too. My work began to become more socially driven and I decided to narrow my work down to Paterson.

I started to research the gangs. Instead of being true gangs they are neighborhoods of kids that have banded together. Their stray fire is what's killing other kids in the community. They have been trading youtube videos back and forth. The "Glock Boys" in the first ward ghetto and the "230 Gang" of the 4th ward have been warring and rapping. I found this quite interesting and terrifying as I watched the guys in the 1st ward swinging their guns. They have since called a truce although shootings continue in Paterson.

I have to say the 4th ward guys are very talented in their productions.

I thought of putting their warring videos up and juxtaposing it with my father's slides of unity, and love and peace and the sounds of the choir in the background. I saw a huge similarity between the kids on the street today "mugging" for the camera (albeit with anger in them) and the street pictures that my dad took of the kids posing for him. In their eyes were love and an appreciation for someone who was out to help them and loved them. Such a contrast. I did end up putting a small video together which I'll upload in my next post.

Ultimately, I've chosen to screen shot some of these scenes and add them to my collage work at this time.