Collection: Issue 03: Silver Screen

After living here, I sat more with my expectations of the city, its reputation, and what it actually is. New York is not just one thing: it is that beautiful, magical playground full of wonder and artistry that you imagine as a kid; it’s also the city of dreams, opportunities, and reinvention for young adults who come from completely different backgrounds and fight tooth and nail to make something bigger of themselves here; and it’s also the only home so many people have ever known, who feel the harsh realities of the city’s systemic problems for generations, still fighting to make it here while loving the city and simultaneously not having made the choice to be here.

My career and passion has always been cinema and movies, and New York-set movies have often been some of my favorites throughout my life. I decided to pay homage to a few of the classic New York City movies that I believe completely embody three very different yet true experiences and pictures of this place: the wide-eyed wonder and fears from the perspective of tourists and kids seen in Home Alone 2, the opportunity for self-change and the beauty and glamor that can mask the gritty struggles and hardships of what it actually takes for most to thrive here in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and the perspective of born-and-bred native New Yorkers balancing the unique tight knit city block community lifestyles with threats of racial tensions, gentrification, and police brutality. If you set them anywhere other than New York City, these movies lose the artistic fabric of their story and themes.