Author: Emily Rapport
-
Mexico
About this series
Select images from this series photographed in Mexico were exhibited at Eat Paint Studio in Chicago, IL.
In “Jarabe Tapatío Dancers, Monterrey, Mexico,” the viewer is transported to another place and time. A courtship dance, photographed against the baroque Spanish architecture of the Palacio del Obispado, represents the woman first rejecting the man’s advances, then eventually accepting them (ah, true love). An expanse of aged stone steps flanked by two black clad figures lead us up toward a swirling costumed dancer framed by white stone columns. The black void of an arched doorway and empty windows pull at our gaze while the suited male dancers anchor us in the frame, creating a space for the coquettish female character to show her desire to be free, while also charming her captors.
“It’s like a song,” says Steiner of how he composes an image. “The elements all have to come together – available light, a look or gesture. It coalesces into something else, suggesting a different meaning. That depth of looking – is subversive because it makes us think.”
via Eat Paint Studio -
Electoral Transmissions
About this series
This series documents media coverage and debates from the 2016 presidential election. Double-exposures and other forms of distortion are used to reflect the increasingly divisive and still polarized viewpoints.
-
Admiral Theater, Chicago, IL
About this series
The Admiral Theatre opened in 1927 in Chicago as a vaudeville house. The Admiral closed sometime in the late 1950s, and remained shuttered for many years until opening in 1969 as an all-cartoon venue. Unable to draw the crowds necessary to remain open, the Admiral closed again. In the early 1970s, the Admiral was opened as an adult movie house. After receiving a facelift in the 1980s, it reopened as a gentleman’s club.
-
Slow & Low, Chicago Lowriders Club
About this series
Since 2010, The Chicago Urban Art Society (CUAS) and the Chicago Lowrider Preservation Fund have coordinated the Slow and Low Community Lowrider Festival. The lowriding scene is diverse with many different cultures, vehicle makes and visual styles.
-
East Chicago, Indiana
About this series
Originally built to house steel workers in 1917, today just 25% of the homes in Marktown are occupied. Remaining houses are abandoned or have been bought and demolished by BP. The BP Whiting refinery looming over Marktown and surrounding areas offers residents a “fair” market value for properties – around $30,000 or less. To families that have lived here their whole lives and are deeply connected to their communities this bargain of necessity does them no favors.
Throughout East Chicago, an eerie sense abandonment hangs in the air like the billowing clouds expelled from the refinery itself. Anywhere you walk in downtown East Chicago, the BP refinery is in view. The smell of oil sticks to you on a hot summer day. Most stores are boarded up or are long gone. Tracks from revved-up u-turns scar the empty parking lots. Still, within this struggling urban landscape some spaces are still bustling. The many churches found in East Chicago are full on Sundays. Here is where people have a place and a purpose. The New Mission Of Jesus Christ Church in East Chicago provides support and a sense of community. In addition to their religious services, The New Mission also runs a community kitchen to assist neighbors who have fallen on hard times.
Marktown has escaped destruction twice, in the 1950’s and the 1970’s, before it earned its historic landmark status. There was even a Marktown Revitalization Plan published in 2008. Less than a decade later, as the Mayor of East Chicago offers residents incentives to move elsewhere, it looks as if the third time it will not be so lucky.
-
Along the Line
About this series
We travel the city each day – to and from work, home, school, errands. By train or by bus we enter the swell of humanity, pack ourselves in with strangers, and hold on tight. For me, the experience of being alone in a crowd is quintessential to modern life. We all struggle to find both a connection with others (and ourselves) and to protect our idea of who we are in the world. In this series, I am documenting moments of connection – where we let our guard down, our minds wander, revealing a fragment of our inner life and humanity. This is an ongoing series.
