Untitled (Wilkes-Barre), Mark Cohen, 1975

gelatin silver print, h 506mm × w 408mm More details
© Mark Cohen

Cohen photographed street life in his hometown of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, for decades. He infiltrated the personal space of the inhabitants and portrayed them in sharp focus and at close range. Nevertheless, his photographs are alienating rather than intimate. His use of extreme cropping, in which only a part of the trunk can be seen, creates a sense of distance. The girls in this photograph, too, remain anonymous because their faces are concealed.