Afrobeats in The NY Times /June 4, 2017 by Ashley Gilbertson

Lagos: Where even the music pirates worry about piracy.

Was lucky to work with Dionne Searcey, the NY Times West Africa bureau chief on a story about Afrobeats in Lagos. Followed around the internationally renowned star Seyi Shay and a young man from the roughest Lagos slum who's trying to make it. Highlights: meeting a guy who calls himself "Fuckmoney" with no sense of irony; bumping into an Emir and a King one night at a show; and when Seyi Shay's assistant got so stoned he forgot the hotel elevator card and just went up and down unable to get out at the right floor.

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Photographing Strangers Workshop this summer in Arles with the @viifoundation Link up top…!

I love photographing Tuesday runs with @orchardstreetrunners. Now I just gotta get enough hustle back to keep up with the lead pack on foot. DM me if you wanna copy or to be tagged. #shotoniphone15pro

Disappearing Bowery, NY

TUESDAYS

First Tuesday back in 2024 with @orchardstreetrunners and New York is better for it. Also messed around with the 5x lens on the iPhone.

Kensington, Philadelphia - some of the toughest and saddest scenes I’ve witnessed here at home since moving here in 2003. Worked with @olivia_reingold of @thefreepress on a piece examining harm reduction, race and addiction on the streets. Head over to read her powerful piece. Two captions of the portraits above: 1. “They’re mean out here. The people here, they have no heart.”, said Crystal, a woman living at a shelter in Kensington. She cried as she recalled a painful upbringing, decisions that led her, she said, to this life today, panhandling and drug addiction. Crystal was on her way to a picnic she had planned with her husband, at a nearby abandoned railway track overgrown with trees - the only place, she said, they could be alone. 2. “I’d like a life where I don’t live like this, but it’s hard to imagine.” Eddie said. He’s been homeless for the past eight years while injecting cocaine and tranq. Eddie trembled and buckled as he spoke: withdrawal. “My body is so far gone, and nobody’s helping me at this point.” He said. And with that Eddie took his possessions -a newspaper, a small carton of milk, and a sweater, and went on in his search for drugs https://www.thefp.com/p/harm-reduction-kensington-causes-harm

I saw over a hundred runners weave their way through traffic over 30 miles around Manhattan this weekend, during @orchardstreetrunners OSR30, a.k.a. The Battle Of The Titans, and known to me as my favorite race of all the races. I stayed mostly on @chaseing.dreams who trailed Diego Arantes for the first leg. Deigo dropped him after Chase made a turn I was sure would cost him the race, so I stayed on Deigo, until a few miles later, Chase appeared, ahead. And that was it for the next twenty miles. From my bike, I’d look around from tight spots I’d get caught in and see them gliding through it all, pedestrians, buses, cars, garbage trucks, cyclists, cops and all the shit all over the roads in our city. They moved like water, and without a sound other than sneakers quietly tapping over the black top. I tried to hold back shouts of excitement when his pace quickened as he ascended those brutal hills on the west side; I watched carefully as his body seemingly collapsed for a few strides as he tried to puke on 11th ave–and then kept going; I studied his face as he grimaced his way through the last leg, teeth bared. I watched him pause, unable to process what had just happened when he broke the tape, and then scream, and then look to the sky, head in hands, and if he didn’t let a tear drop, I did. Respect.

Total Eclipse in Niagara Falls for the @nytimes. Went out on the Maid of The Mist, because why not. Also I didn’t see it because too busy shooting and trying to keep a dry lens. Oops.

March 22, 2024: it’s two o’clock in the morning and just finished chasing more than a hundred runners racing through a mostly sleeping city with @orchardstreetrunners. Just when I think I’m over the city, I’m in love all over again.

Interval training out here @diaartfoundation with @ava_pellor

Tuesday nights with @orchardstreetrunners #shotoniphone15promax