Laundry, Fire Escape, Chinatown. San Francisco, California. July 12, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.
Laundry is hung to dry on fire escape above the streets of Chinatown, San Francisco.
This is a photography from one of my early morning photo-walks in San Francisco last summer. I take the train to the City very early in the morning and then walk. A lot. On this morning I passed through Chinatown on my way to the North Beach area fairly early in the morning – well before the tourist crowds showed up. A few blocks from the main tourist area it is a different world with markets opening up, deliveries being made, and busy people everywhere. I was working in more or less traditional street photographer style – to the extent that someone armed with a DSLR can do that ! – and shooting with just a 50mm prime lens on the camera and trying to work quickly as images presented themselves.
I imagine that many people who pass through here may easily be so focused on the activity at the street level that they might not look up. It often strikes me as surprising that in areas where so much is going on at street level – many people, colorful shop fronts, lots of action – the fronts of buildings right above present a completely different appearance. The first thing that caught my attention here was the laundry festooning the fire escape landings. But I also like the geometry of dark landings, ladders, and pipes against the lighter stucco wall, and the wonderful light coming through the morning haze from upper right and casting the lined shadows across the walls of the building.
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Richard, thanks for dropping by and for your comments. Yes, I’ve heard some stories about some of the stuff that goes on there (and in other parts of The City, too) that are not exactly in keeping with the positive view of the place that we like to focus on. There are, indeed, some questions best not asked!
I love to shoot there, especially in the morning before the tourists arrive. I have a whole series of photographs that I’ve made a couple blocks west of the “main drag” where all of the famous shops are, in a neighborhood that is filled with markets and so forth and which bustles with activity.
Dan
Great observation Dan. When I’ve walked the streets in Chinatown I’m often more curious about what goes on up there than at the street level. I have read that there are some notorious housing projects there though so it’s probably best I didn’t know what happens up there. :-)