The fascinating road images by David Godlis
Photographer David Godlis is perhaps best known for his grainy black and white images of New York's CBGB nightclub, home to punk legends like Ramones, Patti Smith, Blondie and Talking Heads.
Godlis was born in Manhattan in 1951 and began photography in his sophomore year at Boston University. Since then he has been one of the most important image makers of his generation. He has been working as a film photographer at Lincoln Center since the late 1980s and as the unofficial photographer for the New York Film Festival for 25 years.
Above: NYC, 1979; Above: NYC, 1980. All images © David Godlis
However, it was street photography that quickly became Godli's first love after seeing a MoMA retrospective of Diane Arbus in 1972. Shortly thereafter, he enrolled at the Imageworks School of Photography in Cambridge, Massachusetts and began burying himself in the recent history of street photography.
In addition to his other work, a large part of Godlis' early practice consisted of walking the streets of first Boston and then New York City shooting anything that caught his eye.
Boston, 1974
The new book Godlis Streets, published by Reel Art Press, is the first publication devoted to the famous imagemaker's street photography. With a foreword by critic Luc Sante and an afterword by Blondie's co-founder and guitarist Chris Stein, it mainly focuses on his black and white images from the 70s and 80s.
The book examines how much Godlis was influenced by Brassai's haunted reportage of 1930s Paris, along with the work of other street photographers such as Arbus, Robert Frank, Gary Winogrand and Lee Friedlander.
Times Square NYC, 1980
Godli's own approach to street photography was largely instinctive and immediate. He shot scenes and motifs with long Leica handheld shots and only used natural light.
From nuns walking past crude advertisements to signs claiming the end is near. The impressive images testify to the strength and glamor inherent in the photographer's self-declared mission: "It was the streets that I wanted to conquer".
Godlis Streets by David Godlis is published by Reel Art Press; reelartpress.com