Zack Taylor and Professor Paul Adams, Visual Arts

Urban America’s public spaces have long been in danger. Since the age of sprawl began some sixty years ago, inner cities as a whole have been forsaken by those who can afford to leave. The result has been widespread neglect of the nation’s urban areas. An example of such neglect can be seen on New York’s Coney Island. What used to be a mecca of entertainment for all classes and creeds has now largely been forgotten by middle-class America, and has been replaced by privatized theme parks such as Six Flags and Disneyland, that can filter their patronage by charging exorbitant entrance prices.

Coney Island, however, is still very much alive. Although it is true that most people who can afford to go anywhere else inevitably do, the island’s entertainment district is still enjoyed just as much today as it was during the height of its popularity one hundred years ago.

As a photographer, I wanted to show this livelihood to the rest of the world. I wanted to document Coney as a tangible thing of the present, and not just a pleasant piece of American nostalgia. It was important to me, and to the success of my project, that I photograph the smiles on people’s faces, that I document the island’s appeal and importance. I wanted to show my audience that Coney Island can still play a vital role in contemporary America, and indeed does that on any given summer day.

In May of 2005 I moved to New York City for six weeks. I slept on the floor of a friend’s apartment in Manhattan. I made the journey to Coney Island sporadically, going mostly on weekends, but also during the week and on Sundays. Being on the island during the week was a completely different experience from being there on the weekend. During the week it was quiet and somber. There is a certain reverence that hangs heavy in the air. On Saturdays and Sundays, however, the boardwalk transforms and becomes alive with the laughter of New Yorkers of all walks of life. On days like this it truly is, once again, America’s playground.

My research was not done from textbooks or studies, but is in no wise any less valid. My research was done among Coney’s visitors. I walked the boardwalk with them. I ate at Famous Nathan’s with them. I captured them in my camera and have thus taken their stories with me. For the six weeks that I was there, I saw myself not as a visitor or an outsider, but as an inhabitant, and as a witness to the ongoing legacy of the place I was documenting.

I brought home with me some fifty rolls of film. In the five months since my stay in New York, I have gone through these images and edited them according to my goal as a journalist. I assembled pictures that show the range and diversity of the island’s visitors, and I made sure that each image speaks of the area in the present tense as opposed to the past. Thirty-five of these images were printed, matted, and framed, and came together in an exhibit titled “Playground of the World: Photographs of Coney Island.” The show went up in Gallery 303 in the Harris Fine Arts Center on BYU campus on December 11, 2006. An opening reception took place that Friday, December 15. Over one hundred people were in attendance, and most of those asked with great interest about the island and its history. Many told me they had no idea that Coney was still around, and that they would like to research it further. The exhibit will come down tomorrow, December 29, and will then be ready to bring to other galleries. The Photographic Gallery in downtown Manhattan has also agreed to review the work and, if accepted, selects images will be shown there sometime in 2007.

Admittedly, I had never been to Coney Island when I applied for the grant. I could only expect that the island would be a unique place where a rich sense of nostalgia mingles with an undying sense of optimism toward the future. From my research I had seen how Coney had historically given New Yorkers a much needed escape from the routines of the city. I saw that same need being satisfied just a few months ago. My ORCA grant afforded me the opportunity to see a project through, with the help of valuable advice from a trusted mentor, from start to finish. I learned more from spending six weeks on that island than I had in two years in the classroom. Now that the project is complete I am happy to report that my photographs have served as proof that Coney Island is still alive.