A slice of 1970s Americana in the suburbs of Long Island, from one of the era's most iconic documentarians.
"Hometown" collects a series of suburban landscape photographs taken on Long Island between 1973-1980 by Joseph Szabo. Sharing the same DNA as his "Teenage" and "Almost Grown" series, Szabo's "Hometown" images conjure up an instant nostalgia, recalling fond memories of Szabo's childhood and adolescence in suburbia. Szabo explains, "The 'Hometown' scenes reminded me of places I knew from my youth, places that I saw on my way to school, church, or the museum. They struck an emotional chord in me, one that is hard to put into words but that revealed their connection to my own past. In that sense, 'Hometown' is autobiographical." Building on his past work, "Hometown" gives context to the suburban lives that Szabo has documented so effectively for almost forty years.
Joseph Szabo (born 1944 in Toledo, Ohio) is a photographer, teacher and author. He taught photography and art at Malverne High School on Long Island for 27 years and for over 20 years at the International Center of Photography in Manhattan.
His 1978 book, "Almost Grown," featured many of his students and was acclaimed as one of the "Best Books of the Year" by the American Library Association, and attained cult classic status in the fashion world throughout the 80s and 90s. In 2003, Szabo released "Teenage" his more complete view of adolescents coming of age. His book "Jones Beach" captures his forty year exploration of summer at New York's most popular beach. Szabo's evocative black and white images have won him worldwide recognition and admiration, from photographers including Bruce Weber and filmmakers Cameron Crowe and Sofia Coppola.
Joseph Szabo is the recipient of a photography fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and his images reside in the collections of the Bibliotheque National in Paris, The George Eastman House Museum in Rochester, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the San Francisco Museum of Art, among many others. His photographs have been published in The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The London Times, French Vogue, Women's Wear Daily and exhibited at galleries in Paris, London, Japan, New York, Atlanta and Los Angeles.
