Nightlife
Statement
“My first night in Bedford-Stuyvant I laid in bed staring at my eggshell colored walls and the brief break from the color out of the window into a green backyard. It was far from a silent night because I could hear my neighbors playing Miles Davis so loud I thought it was the second coming of Christ the Bible talks about in revelations. It was near the end of the 2020 pandemic. I had just moved from Washingtons Heights where my walls bled Salsa, but a salsa derived from jazz. Heavy boisterous trumpets, vibrant Claves directing the pace of the song.-
“I used to hop on the A/C line from Harlem to party in Brooklyn and that motivated my move to Bed-stuy because at night I would always have to add an hour into my commute due to delays. On my Friday nights I’d find my self in dark rooms, LEDs blanketed the skin of the young underground. The pianos that echoed through my walls during the day were replaced by Metallic synths, the claves reverbed; thin pointed drums, fluid melodies and earthquaking bass with an emphasis on importation forming a Techno-House hybrid. “
“I think of time as pond most times, the life below causing the surface to ripple. I think of the underground culture the same as our past rippling into our now surfaced present. Living through a pandemic halted lives of most young people. We had no where to discover, to feel, release, to love or express ourselves during this pivotal moments of out lives. In these warehouses nearing the end of the pandemic freedom was felt. Many of these feelings reflected in The Great Migration that contributed to the rise of jazz in Harlem and Bed-stuy; it was the euphoric culmination of suppression from a dark reality of the South into freedom through music. Through Nightlife. “
“In this series I wanted to depict what that freedom looked like in our time, coming out of global fear of the future and political scandal under the Trump administration. Also an honorable mention to Nightclubbing by Grace Jone.”
