Barbara Mensch, "South Street," and the Fulton Fish Market

In the posting Loaders, Lumpers and the Smell of Fish the New York Times blog the “City Room” writes about South Street by Barbara Mensch. The post coincides with a new exhibition of Barbara Mensch’s photographs of the Fulton Fish Market at the South Street Seaport Museum.

The Times has also posted a slideshow of images from the book and the exhibition detailing life at the Fulton Fish Market during the late 1970s and early 80s—the years right before gentrification started to take hold and the mob influence was swept away by then New York district attorney, Rudolph Giuliani. Now that the fish market has moved to Hunts Points section of the Bronx, Mensch’s photographs offer an extraordinary portrait of a New York City that is rapidly disappearing. “City Room” writes:

Ms. Mensch is fascinated—and saddened—by what she views as the “profound change in the urban landscape of New York,” a change that is sweeping away so much of the city’s past. Yet, she insisted, “It’s not about nostalgia. It’s about what do we replace all these things we’re destroying with? Where are we going as a culture — as a civilization – when we walk around and everything looks like interchangeable?”