Matt Weber (Street photography), Color, Men of New York, Portraits

“Bobby Long” 2010

I saw Bobby the other day and he’s not doing very well. I can tell you he’s had a rough life without exaggerating. He told me he was a photographer too once upon a time. He did recognize my M6 so I think he may have been telling me the truth. Something went terribly wrong when he was much younger. Not that I know all the details, but he was incarcerated  forty years ago. It was the one of the last prisons you would want to be in 1971…He was in Attica when the shit hit the fan!

© Matt Weber

Matt Weber (Street photography), Color, Kids & Teens

Riverside Park 2011

When I took this picture in Riverside Park, I had just finished smoking a small but succulent cigar with my friend Dave Beckerman, a talented photographer, who had recently given up smoking cigarettes. When I was a teenager like these kids, I would have to keep my eyes peeled for cops, if I were to smoke something. As of today, mayor Bloomberg has imposed a new anti-smoking law which many feel is unfair, and others are celebrating. I don’t want kids to start smoking cigarettes and cigars are too strong for most kids and most women. They are either loved or loathed by all. I haven’t done shit worth spouting about, but plenty of older men have been sitting on a park bench and enjoying their tobacco for decades. Many of them served in the second world war or Korea. Others Vietnam. Most have paid their dues one way or another, and deserve the pleasure of sitting in the park and puffing their stinky cigars and deadly cigarettes, while they read their newspapers. I think that if one occasionally smells a whiff of tobacco in the air, they will most probably be no worse for the wear. Now for the first time in decades, I will have to break the law if I want to smoke a cigar, and I don’t like it… Very few people like cigar smoke, so very few will feel a bit of concern for my plight. That’s cool. I may not deserve sympathy, but the oldtimers do…

All Photos © Matt Weber

Matt Weber (Street photography), Color, Coney Island, signs, Women of New York

“Jesus Freak” 2010

I don’t know where to start. It’s 5/21/11 and supposedly the world is about to end. I’ve heard first hand from one of these lunatics that there’s only room for 200,000,000 souls in heaven. That’s like 3% of the people on earth. Talking to this lost soul for a few minutes, I heard the standard rhetoric: We are all sinners and must repent or burn forever. I asked her if the cigarette lighter I stole from Woolworth’s was a big enough sin to be burned, and she said, yes! I asked if “God doesn’t recognize the difference between stealing a 19¢ lighter when I was ten, and maybe stealing billions of dollars like Bernie Madoff?” She said no…All sins are sins and must be repented for. God doesn’t play favorites between those who are starving and steal an apple, and those who are filthy rich and steal someone’s life savings! OK, I walk away as usual, unable to make a single point as she kept shouting how I was going to burn…She is probably praying up real good right now and when the world doesn’t end, I wonder if she’ll feel any relief, or disappointment that she didn’t get to meet Jesus. I think that this Mr. Camping schmuck is really evil and shouldn’t have been given the time of day by the press. Of course he spent over 100 million dollars spreading his doomsday message. Money talks and you know what walks. I feel bad for the millions of people who have actually been preparing for the end and feeling extremely scared for the past week or so. I’ve been at gunpoint several times and know how frightening it can be. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone…

All Photos © Matt Weber