GOST presents White Socks, a collection of mostly previously unseen photos of New York City from renowned American photographer Mark Cohen.
Born in the small city of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, Cohen is something of a rarity among street photographers of his era. While many sought the endless inspiration of New York City, Cohen stayed in Wilkes-Barre for much of his life.
His signature in-your-face style, characterized by close-up, intrusive shots, influenced a host of renowned photographers, including Bruce Gilden and Martin Parr, was forged in this small, unassuming town.
However, in July 1973, Cohen spent a brief but prolific month in New York, living in a dorm room while attending a film production workshop at NYU. His classes were short, so he spent his free time wandering the city streets, photographing relentlessly, a habit that would define his career. Most of the images he shot during this time remained unseen—until now.
The summer of 1973 marked a pivotal moment in New York’s history. While the full-scale fiscal crisis that nearly bankrupted the city wouldn’t arrive for a few more years, the city was already showing signs of decline. Budget cuts, failing infrastructure, and rising unemployment were taking their toll. Crime rates were up, and more upwardly mobile families were leaving for quieter suburban lives, while the infamous fires in the Bronx, where landlords were burning their properties for insurance money, were just beginning.
Amidst this chaos, Cohen took to the streets, capturing everyday life in his signature, dynamic, in-your-face style.
Street photographers are lauded for their ability to “see” frames, isolating a small, rectangular section of the larger scene before them. Cohen, however, took this to another level. Faces are often cut off or cropped dramatically, leaving just fragments of expression.
There is no logical, linear narrative. Images unfold in a chaotic mosaic of limbs and concrete, a dynamic, frenetic collision—much like life on the streets of NYC at the time—each one a small part of a larger story, one we can only imagine.
You can almost feel the thick summer humidity, the sweat-speckled skin on display, the stench of garbage that lined the streets (a direct result of budget cuts and city mismanagement that led to sanitation delays, and eventually, strikes by frustrated workers).
It’s visceral and raw, at times, dirty, but it’s also the New York many long for—chaotic, but alive.
The sounds of disco reverberating through hidden clubs, the streets and subway cars covered in graffiti, and artists transforming decaying urban landscapes into kaleidoscopic masterpieces. Punk bands emerged, brash and rebellious, carving out their place in the city’s frenzied energy. In this fractured moment, all these worlds collided, setting the stage for cultural revolutions that would define the coming decades, an era hard to imagine, now buried beneath the sanitized, globalized streets of today.
Perhaps Cohen was unaware of the seismic cultural, social, and economic shifts taking place—or perhaps he didn’t care. He’s always been an enigmatic figure, uninterested in trends or movements. But in his own unique, and sometimes controversial way, he captures the zeitgeist of the time.
White Socks is compelling and evocative. It’s chaotic and captivating—it’s quintessentially Cohen. A small but significant contribution to the goldmine that is New York City street photography.
All images © Mark Cohen
Tall Socks is published by GOST and is available via their website.