Henry Chalfant – Art vs. Transit (Special Edition)

Henry Chalfant is best known for co-publishing SUBWAY ART. By participating with his platform collage shots he perfectly balanced the more staged cityscape photographs by Martha Cooper and made the book an iconic classic. With a background as an artist he seemingly wanted to capture the details of the works writers back then executed on the subway train cars of New York City.

In 2019 Chalfant did the Art vs. Transit 1977-1987 exhibition in the Bronx Museum, which was previously shown in Madrid, Spain. The accompanying (English and Spanish) exhibition catalogue covers a ten year span in which the photographer captured some of the most important pieces on subways of New York’s trainwriting peak. The 154-paged publication comes as a Swiss binding hardcover with large sized wagon shots on most spreads. It is separated into four chapters: Essays (Sacha Jenkins, SHARP, curator SUSO33, MARE139), Trains, They Took the City and Exhibition.

Besides an introduction by the photographer the book also includes a timeline with important hip hop culture occasions since 1973 and portrait shots showing e.g. the ROCK STEADY CREW, DJ KAY SLAY or young MARE and MIN painting trains at night. But for graffiti enthusiasts the main highlights might be the almost close-up shots featuring works from BILROCK, BIL BLAST, BLADE, CAP, CRASH, DAZE, DELTA2, DEZ, DONDI, DUSTER, KEL139, KID PANAMA, MAZE, MIN, NOC167, PART, QUIK, REVOLT, SAK, SEEN, SHARP, SHY147, SKEME, T-KID, TRAP, ZEPHYR, and others.

154 pages, 31,4 cm x 23,5 cm, hardcover with embossing, Swiss binding, different papers, steel slipcase 
Language: English, Spanish
Release date: October 2019
ISBN: 978-0-9844715-8-4
Publisher: Eric Firestone Press