Philip-Lorca diCorcia

New York City (Fred)

New York City (Fred) is a color photograph by Philip-Lorca diCorcia and part of the artist’s long-running photographic series Storybook Life. The disparate images amassed over 20 years were never originally intended to be presented together, but were ultimately later composed into a book titled A Storybook Life in 2003. The book explores narrative and meaning produced through the interactions of seemingly disparate imagery. This particular photograph features a suited man, Fred, after just having fallen off the curb on a New York City street. The closed storefronts and empty street compound the man’s sudden stasis, while in the foreground loose newspapers flutter in the wind. The man appears at once ashamed and shocked by his sudden change of circumstance; confined to the ground as he reaches for his glasses. As in much of the artist’s work, immobility is a constant, psychological tension and dramatic equilibrium define his photographs. New York City (Fred) turns the conventional image of a professional, white-collar man on its head by capturing his subject in a state of vulnerability, unsettling traditional representations of masculinity.