103 Bowery

You are standing at the former site of the Blossom Restaurant and barber shop shown in Berenice Abbott's iconic Depression era photograph, one of several Bowery images in her influential Changing New York series.
An Ohio born expatriate in 1920s Paris, she became darkroom assistant to Man Ray and built a reputation as a portrait photographer of artists like James Joyce and Jean Cocteau. inspired by Eugene Atget who captured images of old Paris before it disappeared, she returned to New York in 1929 and began a decade long quest to photograph a similarly changing New York, contrasting with older neighborhoods that were soon to vanish.
Seeing her gritty images of the Bowery, an official of the Federal Arts Project warned Abbott that "nice girls" don't go to such places. To which she replied, "I'm not a nice girl. I'm a photographer."
- Joan Jubela, Writer/Educator

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