C U L photography T BRIGHT NIGHTS PHOTOGRAPHER LYNN SAVILLE SEES NEW YORK CITY IN A CERTAIN LIGHT by Nicole Pezold / GSAS ’04 UR hotographer Lynn celli), bestows them with an decades worth of nighttime im - E Saville generally unexpected beauty. Luminous ages, much of them focused on works alone. With blues, from desert turquoise to the city’s architecture, and pieces P a small, collapsible cobalt, accented with pinks, or - from her oeuvre grace the col - tripod and two anges, and amber, highlight emp - lections of the Brooklyn Muse - cameras, she scouts New York ty rail yards, loading docks, shells um and the New York Public City’s unpopulated, weed- of warehouses, the bellies of Library. Art critic Arthur Danto, choked fringes, from Gowanus in overpasses, and elevated subway in Night/Shift ’s introduction, Brooklyn to Hunts Point in the platforms. Saville admits she felt compares her to Eugène Atget, Bronx, by both bus and foot. She some urgency to record these the ambitious photographer who may wander up and down a des - streetscapes because—even in the documented Paris’s empty streets olate block absorbed by angles midst of a recession—it seems in the early 20th century. and, especially, points of illumi - only a matter of time before Saville is no preservationist. nation. She shoots at twilight, they’re claimed for condos, bank She was trained at the Pratt Insti - when the sky fades in cinematic branches, and Duane Reades. “I tute as a street photographer. In tension with freshly lit street love the way the city looks now the vein of celebrated artists An - lamps and floodlights. “I feel and have this fear that developers dré Kertész and Garry Winogrand, drawn to these places that seem will come and collapse whole she set out to capture the experi - almost pastoral, that had been in - blocks and put up something ence of street life at random mo - dustrial and now things are shift - anonymous,” she says. Saville, ments—but was drawn to the ing; forgotten unloved places,” who co-teaches the “New York urban landscape instead. She cred - Saville explains. at Twilight” course with night its her fascination with light to a Unloved they may be, but photographer Kay Kenny at the drawing class, where a model was Saville’s lens, as revealed in her School of Continuing and Pro - sitting under a spotlight. The as - recent book Night/Shift (Mona - fessional Studies, has amassed two signment was to fill a piece of pa - P H O T O fashion S © L Y N N S A V I L L E Music That Wears Well They’re paired with skinny jeans and a scarf at Urban Outfitters. They’re on the rack next to the LnA col - lection at Bloomingdale’s. They’re pictured in the pages of Nylon magazine and on Vogue ’s blog. Jere - my Wineberg’s Music Tees have arrived—now if only they were easier to explain. Wineberg (GAL ’11) came up with the idea to put the cover art (on front) and track names (back) from new albums onto T-shirts. Simple enough, right? But the shirts also come with a tag displaying a code that en - ables fashionistas to download the album from Music Tee’s Web site. And despite Wineberg’s initial difficul - LEFT: IN “WEST 42ND STREET,” SAVILLE CAPTURES THE SEEDY TIMES SQUARE OF 1998 BEFORE ITS FULL CLEANSING. RIGHT: SHE HAS ALSO ty explaining the concept—he kept reinforcing that the TRAINED HER LENS ON LESSER KNOWN INDUSTRIAL QUARTERS, SUCH AS THE HACKENSACK BRIDGE. shirt doesn’t actually play music—Music Tees have attracted a cultish following and collaboration with per with charcoal and then erase ethereal figure made the picture. artists such as David Gray, Mos Def, and Perez Hilton to find the image. “It was a ma - Her next project is to capture (TSOA ’00), pictured below . “It’s still fairly new but jor moment for me,” Saville says, more of these sorts of anony - has this cool factor,” Wineberg says. to realize one could bring light mous interlopers. Some neigh - out of dark. Ever since, she has borhoods, however, are now so The grad student will soon expand his fashion hori - tried to replicate that grainy con - clogged with foot traffic that zons with the Movie Tee, which features art from up - trast in her photos. In her 1997 they no longer lend themselves coming films and lets wearers download them after book, Acquainted With the Night as subjects. Today it would be release. Just think Netflix meets American Apparel. (Rizzoli), this aesthetic lent a impossible to re-create “West —Lori Higginbotham film noir look to black-and- 42nd Street,” taken just off P white images of New York and Times Square in 1998. In the H O T far-flung places such as Greece photograph, a wall of shabby, O © G E and India. rainbow-shuttered businesses T T Y I Recently, Saville has started looms at the viewer, while a leg - M A G E to confront a problem: people gy woman, likely a prostitute, S Saville felt some urgency to record these streets before the y’re claimed for condos, bank branches, and Duane Reades. walking into her shots. As she sashays into the background. was snapping “39 Washington “I was actually scared that some - Street,” in the DUMBO section one was going to mug me,” Sav - of Brooklyn for her latest book, ille remembers of the shoot. a young woman in a white dress “Now the problem is somebody hurried into the shadows of the will trip over your tripod.” frame. At first Saville was an - noyed, but sifting through the Saville is represented by Yancey negatives she realized that this Richardson Gallery. NYU / SPRING 2010 / 23 CREDITS ALUMNI ON THE HUNT FOR AWARDS SEASON GOLD P H GEOFFREY FLETCHER O (TSOA ’99) T O S : became the first African-American T O P screenwriter to win an Academy © J O H Award when he took home the Best N P . J Adapted Screenplay statue this year O H N S for the drama Precious , for which he O N / S U also won Best First Screenplay at M M I T the Film Independent’s Spirit E N T JUAN JOSÉ CAM - E Awards… R T A I PANELLA N (TSOA ’78, ’88) snagged M E N T the Oscar for Best Foreign Language ; B O T Film for El Secreto de Sus Ojos (The T O M Secret in Their Eyes ), which he wrote © T O D and directed… NICKIE RAN HUAI D W A SHAHAR LEVAVI W (SCPS ’04), R Y C BRETT M C- H (SCPS ’04), and U K / CONNELL A . (SCPS ’03) worked as M . P . A part of the groundbreaking visual- . S . effects team on James Cameron’s LETTERS TO JULIET $400-million-blockbuster Avatar , which won three Oscars—includ - awards season with three Best Ac - better known as front woman Karen ing Best Visual Effects—of nine to - tor wins—at the Emmy, Golden O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, was up tal nominations, among them Globe, and Screen Actors Guild for two Grammys, including Best GWENDOLYN YATES WHITTLE ’s awards—for his role as the sharp- Alternative Music Album… At this (TSOA ’84) nod for Best Sound Ed - tongued network suit on the NBC year’s Sundance Film Festival, iting… SALLY MENKE (TSOA ’77), comedy 30 Rock … The Hangover , DEBRA GRANIK (TSOA ’01) won who edits all of Quentin Taranti - directed by TODD PHILLIPS both the dramatic Grand Jury Prize no’s movies, was up for Best Film (TSOA ’94), was named Best Com - and the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Editing for Inglourious Basterds … edy at the Golden Globe Awards, Award for writing and directing the The dark comedy A Serious Man where MARTIN SCORSESE (WSC bleak family tale Winter’s Bone , with earned JOEL COEN (TSOA ’78) and ’64, STEINHARDT ’68, HON cinematography by MICHAEL brother Ethan two Oscar nomina - ’92) was honored with the Cecil B. MCDONOUGH (TSOA ’98)… NICK tions, including Best Picture, as well DeMille Award for lifetime QUESTED (TSOA ’93) executive as a nod for Best Director at the Spir - achievement… MICHAEL C. HALL produced Restrepo , which follows a GEOFFREY FLETCHER it Awards, where they were also (TSOA ’96) won Best Actor statues platoon in Afghanistan and was cho - honored with the Robert Altman at both the Golden Globe and sen for the U.S. documentary Grand ’05), who penned the script with Award alongside the film’s casting Screen Actors Guild awards for his Jury Prize… Audience awards at the SOPHIE GOODHART (TSOA ’03). director RACHEL TENNER (WSC performance as the titular serial killer festival went to LUCY WALKER Fellow alum DANIEL VECCHIONE ’92)… CARY JOJI FUKUNAGA ’s on Showtime’s Dexter … STEVE (TSOA ’98) for her documentary, (TSOA ’09) was the film’s cine - (TSOA nongrad alum) immigration BODOW (TSOA ’95), DAVID Waste Land , about scavenging at the matographer… BARBARA WHIT - thriller Sin Nombre , which he wrote JAVERBAUM (TSOA ’95), and EL - world’s largest landfill, in the World MAN (GAL ’88) is a producer of the as his NYU graduate thesis, scored LIOTT KALAN (TSOA ’03) scored Cinema competition, and TV actor Tony Award–winning musical Next three Spirit Award nods, including Emmys for Outstanding Writing for JOSH RADNOR (TSOA ’99) for his to Normal , now in its second year on Best Director and Best Feature… their Comedy Central hit The Dai - debut comedy happythankyoumore - Broadway… Next month’s roman - The star-studded musical Nine , pro - ly Show With Jon Stewart … STEFANI please , which he wrote, directed, tic comedy Letters to Juliet stars duced by MARC PLATT (LAW ’82), GERMANOTTA (TSOA nongrad and starred in… The Best of Next Vanessa Redgrave and Amanda racked up four nominations at the alum), aka Lady Gaga, took home award—honoring a low-budget Seyfried, and was inspired by the Oscars and five more at the Golden two Grammys for her multiplat - film—was given to Homewrecker , the eponymously named book by Ceil Globe Awards… ALEC BALDWIN inum debut album, The Fame … screwball romantic comedy co-di - and LISE FRIEDMAN (GAL part- (TSOA ’94) pulled off a hat trick this KAREN ORZOLEK (TSOA ’01), rected by BRAD BARNES (TSOA time professor).