I was admitted to the Photojournalism class at the International Center of Photography (ICP) in New York in the beginning of the 1990s. Equipped with film cameras Nikon F3 and Leica M3, I discovered a New York City beyond the cliches and it really captivated me.
I loved the cultural mix of people, smell and sounds from the streets and I soon started to feel at home even though some of the places were quite dangerous. The small Leica model allowed me to become more ‘invisible’ and to get closer to difficult situations when I was for example shooting homeless people.
Tompkins Square Park at Lower East Side, New York was a center stage for a great deal of communal anger and dissension. I was photographing intensively the homeless people living there and when they visited the community church for a meal or other daily activities. A riot erupted in the park in 1991 when police attempted to clear the park of homeless people and the year after they also cleared a vacant lot close by.
For three intensive years in New York I photographed homeless people and public demonstrations on a variety of human right issues, while also freelancing for local NYC based papers and the Swedish daily newspaper Aftonbladet while at the same time doing an internship at Magnum Photos, assisting photographers, and attending classes and workshops.
The Alternative Museum at Broadway featured two of my images of homeless people in their Alternative Museum Benefit Portfolio. Other exhibitions were held at various galleries and fairs such as the Ledels Gallery in Soho, New York, and also in Sweden, at the Gothenburg International Photography Fair.
