Photo credit: Colleen Hayes
“…This is the world that David Scheinbaum captures with effortless brilliance and transcendent beauty. His images stick in the eye for their lean and muscular portrayals of bodies in motion, and for their voluptuous characterizations of mouths in movement. He catches speech the moment it spills from lips fixed around sentences that rush in staccato fury or fall back in asymmetrical repose. Scheinbaum’s aesthetic voice and visual language speak through images that zing , blur, haze, identify, splatter, brush, clarify, and even coagulate like celluloid blood on fleshly surfaces. If renowned photographer Roy DeCarava famously shot the sound he saw when Coltrane blew his horn, then David Scheinbaum shoots the music he tastes when his eyes are hungry for poetic truth. If hip-hop artists are ghetto deities born to fly the artistic coop and soar to the musical heavens and back, then Scheinbaum is one of their most faithful chroniclers, recording their ascent or return one gesture, one image, at a time. To paraphrase the holy book: In the beginning was the word, and the word became flesh and spoke among us through pavement prophets. What they said is on record; how they looked when they said what they said is on record, too. Turn these pages and see…”
Michael Eric Dyson, excerpt from the introduction to Hip Hop: Portraits of an Urban Hymn.
Interview between Frank Goodyear and David Scheinbaum, November 4, 2012
Frank Goodyear [FG]: David, let me begin by asking you how the series began. I know the story of your attending shows with your son Zac, but what prompted you to bring a camera to these performances?
David Scheinbaum [DS]: You know, the story with Zac is really key. Inspired by a teacher who was originally from the South Bronx, he and a number of his friends got involved with break-dancing and hip-hop music and culture here in Santa Fe. Of course, that led to them wanting to go to concerts, and it turned out that I was the only parent who was willing to drive them. As this was a group of twelve-year-old kids, I felt that I had to stay, in part because I knew so little about hip-hop. What I did know I had learned from the mass media, which at the time generally presented a negative image of hip-hop in terms of violence and gang activity and shootings and stabbings and such. So I stayed, and I sat in the back of the venue that night watching. Everything I saw that evening was positive, as well as my interactions with the other young people who were at the concert. Once the word got out that I was going to be taking them again, a few parents called with concerns. “Is this safe? Are you going to stay with them? Isn’t there violence there? Aren’t there drugs? Isn’t there, you know, bad language?’ My answer to most of those questions was basically, “Yeah, I guess.” Photographing these performances didn't occur to me at first. But after a couple shows I realized that if I was going to be attending concerts with these kids for a while, perhaps I could use my camera to try to show people what really goes on. Being put in the position of being a spokesperson for something that clearly I was not qualified to be a spokesperson about fascinated me. I didn't consider at first what it would take to photograph there. Certainly it wasn't as easy as bringing my camera and just starting to photograph, because there were many barriers to that. Once I decided to bring my camera, it took close to a year before I was able to position myself to where I wanted to be as a photographer in terms of access.
FG: Were there specific things that you saw at shows that interested you as a photographer? Was it the musicians, the crowd, or was it the whole ambiance of the scene?
DS: It was the whole scene, though I need to add that what led me to do this work was driven by a lot of things in my past. Music in my youth was not just a form of entertainment; it was very much my social group. The way I looked, the way I dressed was very much in line with the performers we were listening to. It was through music that I received my news, formed my politics. It drove so much of my experiences as a teenager in terms of experimenting with various things and lifestyles. It’s what we all rallied around. I experienced that same youth revel at that first hip-hop concert with Zac. There was a social code there. There was a dress; there was a look; there was a style; there was a handshake. There was joy and love and anincredible positive enthusiasm in this crowd. And there were artists who, before or after their performances, would talk about politics and what was going on. Whether it was George Bush or Obama, or whether they were talking about educating yourselves or taking care of each other and watching each other's back, there was this incredible rapport that the performers had. Before and after the show the musicians would walk through the crowd and be part of the venue. It wasn't like they were hiding backstage. There was this incredible relationship between the concertgoers and the performers, and it reminded me a lot of my youth. Back in the 1960s the music became a voice for a generation, and so here it was all again, and I was thrilled to see it. At first I was shocked and surprised that I was even permitted to make photographs. They didn't make me sit in the back or stand in a corner or something. They totally welcomed me. It got to the point where I was allowed not only to photograph, but I was welcomed on stage, backstage, which is where I wanted to be. And as much as it took a lot of time and patience with permissions and personalities, the bottom line was that I was accepted into this culture as a total outsider. I found it to be a remarkable and very positive experience.
FG: You mention that there were barriers you encountered. What were the specific challenges associated with doing photography in these spaces?
DS: The initial challenge was getting permission and access, and that took a long time. When I first met Thomas, the person who promoted the shows at the Sunshine Theater in Albuquerque, where I did most of my work, he was supportive, as he had seen me there before with these young kids from Santa Fe. After initially meeting it took close to a year of writing emails, letters, phone calls and tracking him down in Albuquerque to get to the point of me explaining to him what I hoped to do with my camera and to secure his permission and support. This journey ended with Thomas and I meeting face to face at a Starbucks in Albuquerque with me pulling prints out of a portfolio approximately the size of the table we were sitting at. But this only gotme into the theater with my camera. The big part of that first year, the big barrier, was actually getting permission to photograph the various artists, because each travels with an entourage, a show manager, a stage manager. Some people don't want you photographing at all. Some people only want you photographing the first few songs. Some people won't allow you on stage. But many were very supportive from the start. It took a good part of a year until I was able to create the kind of network to support this project. Another person who was a great help to me was Tom Sarig who I originally met as the husband of a client. Upon finding out that he was an AR man for MCA records who was working very closely with both Blackalicious and The Roots, and many other hip hop groups, and it as through his support and generosity that I was able to get connected within a number of managers, record labels and PR firms who were also instrumental in my ability to photograph. Another very important aspect was having the support of 2 local newspaper editors, Rob Dean from the Santa Fe New Mexican, and Julia Goldberg from the Santa Fe Reporter whom both helped me with press credentials and access to some of the other venues that I photographed in. In terms of photographic challenges, the big problem was that I had never used an automatic camera with auto focus. At the first two shows that I went to with my 35 mm camera, I found out quickly that there was no time to focus. By the time I had the camera focused, the shot was over. Like a lot of street photographers I learned to start shooting from the hip, taking pictures without really looking in the camera. Literally and figuratively I was shooting in the dark. I was guessing at exposure; I was guessing at focus. Things were moving fast. But from those first few rolls of film, there turned out to be a few photographs that I'm very attached to, including especially images of a crew from Oakland, California called Hieroglyphics. By the third time I went to photograph, I borrowed a camera from a former student of mine who was also teaching at Santa Fe University. It was an autofocus Canon or something. I had never used autofocus before, but it made all the difference in the world. It was good in low light, and it focused really well. Afterwards I purchased a Contax 35 mm camera to use for this hip-hop work. I bought it because I believe it had at the time the fastest autofocus in low light situations. You could be in a totally darkened room and the camera would actually focus on what you are pointing it at. That became the camera that ninety-five percent of my black and white was shot with.
FG: Regarding the long history of photographers documenting musical performance or creating artistic work that responds to music, were there specific photographers who were influential to you?
DS: In terms of music photography, the only photographer I was really aware of and still primarily the only one that inspires me is Roy DeCarava. Though I can't say I studied with him, when I went to Brooklyn College, my teachers Barney Cole, Walter Rosenblum, and Murray Weiss, were former members of the Photo League and later the Photographer's Forum. Every few months Roy DeCarava would visit as a guest artist to do critiques with our class. I was able to learn from him and talk with him and have him comment on my work when I was a student. And it was probably through meeting him at that time that I attained a serious interest in his work, especially the jazz images that ended up being published in his book, The Sound I Saw. Those photographs are very gutsy. He’s pushing his film, increasing the speed and compensating for that in the darkroom. By the time I began photographing hip-hop shows in the late nineties, you could buy film like 3200 and I was pushing Tri-X to 1600. The photographs from my first group of concerts were very much modeled after the look and the feeling that I admired in those DeCarava photographs. You feel there's spontaneity in those photographs and the framing is a little off kilter. They're taken looking up, looking down, looking to the side. They're low light. They're grainy. The look of the photograph corresponds with the feel of the club and the feel of the music. Julia Margaret Cameron was also a photographer who gave me the energy to proceed along this new path. During her day many criticized her portraits for being out of focus and misunderstood her technique for a lack of talent. In correspondence with Sir John Herschel, she wrote, "What is focus, and who has a right to say what correct focus is?" I don't know if that’s exactly right, but it's the way I remember it. That was one of Beaumont Newhall’s favorite quotes. When I make pictures that are blurry or they move or they're fuzzy, I think of her and the sheer emotional strength of her photographs. That's what gets me through my darkroom session when I'm printing these images that are not so sharp. She and her work have probably given me more artistic license than anyone besides Roy DeCarava.
FG: David, let's transition to the tradition of concert films. You have told me in the past about your admiration for films like Martin Scorsese’s "The Last Waltz," which was released in 1978. I don't know whether you've seen Mel Stuart’s Wattstaxabout the famous 1972 music festival at the LA Coliseum, but it shares much in common with Scorsese’s film. To what degree has film shaped your thinking about how to portray your subjects and to document these performances?
DS: "The Last Waltz" is a favorite film of mine. Because of my love for The Band and their music, I have seen it many times. I can't say that I was consciously aware of how it was shot. At least at first. When I saw it later on DVD and watched an interview with Scorsese, he spoke about how important it was to have cameras set up on stage behind and to the side of the performers. As a filmmaker he was trying to document the music and the performance. It made sense that one needs to be up there with the performers. The whole notion of looking toward the audience, instead of being in the audience looking at the stage, this was all an epiphany for me. When I watched the film again, I looked at the camera shots and the camera angle. One of the beauties of that film is that you feel like you're there. You're right there in it, and it's because of the point of view of the camera. I don't know how many shows I had photographed when I became aware of this, but from that point on I decided that I needed to shoot from the stage. Though I try to stay in the wings so the audience doesn't see me, being onstage and being a few feet behind or next to the musicians is where I want to be. Of course, the performers move around a lot. That said, once they see me photographing, they'll often come my direction and help to make sure I'm getting shots. They have helped me in their own way, knowing what I'm trying to do with my work.
FG: Let's continue with you being onstage. What are you looking for during a performance? Are you concentrating on a particular individual? Are you looking for a variety of details among different people? Or is it a process of discovery—that you don't know exactly what you're looking for when you get onstage and begin your work?
DS: I want to see their eyes, their faces, and to capture how they perform. This emphasis grows out of what I'm trying to achieve. I want to create portraits that counter the whole gangster image of rappers and hip-hop artists. It's important to me to photograph these performers as human beings. To do so, you need to see their eyes and their faces. Of course, there’s a lot happening on stage, and at times I’m interested in capturing the movement—the hand movements, the foot movements, the body movements. Those pictures are part of trying to get a feel for the music. To depict sound visually is not an easy thing to do. Alfred Stieglitz talked about hearing the music of Ernest Bloch in your mind when you looked at his “Equivalents.” But to capture music in a still photograph that doesn't have a soundtrack, you end up one way or another concerned about motion, lighting, and other things. But again, I'm always trying to capture their eyes, because if you can't access a person through their eyes, they remain, to me, anonymous. They're just a figure. For example, with photographs of workers from the Farm Security Administration archives, you'll see many images where people's faces are hidden in shadow and the picture becomes simply an example of a “farm worker.” But when you see a picture of a person in the fields with a hoe in their hand and you see the sweat on their brow and the glint in their eye, you begin to see into their soul. It's no longer a "farm worker." It's now a picture of a person.
FG: At the same time, as you well know, performers tend to wear different masks. They have a stage mask, a public face that they wear to the world, and then they have a more private self, or even multiple private selves. To what degree is your work interested in exploring these different personas? For instance, in a photograph such as your portrait of Daniel Dumile, aka MF Doom, he literally wears a mask on stage. This alternate persona is an important part of his act. And then there are more intimate likenesses such as your tender portrait of Mos Def taken close-up backstage.
DS: I tend to photograph people with their mask on. That's what I am more likely to have the opportunity to do. The Mos Def image is different because it was made after a performance. Things were relaxed. We were in a party-type room, and I said, “Hey, do you mind—can I take a few photographs?” It was just he and I. I find that photograph so compelling and so beautiful and so open. But the truth is that I don't have that opportunity often. Most of my photographs are taken during the performance, so everyone is in their persona. They're dressed for the show.
FG: There are certain groups and individual performers whom you've seen many times over a long time period. Can you speak a little about your relationship with those groups?
DS: There are several performers whom I've photographed many times. The crew from Hieroglyphics, some of the members of Souls of Mischief, Del—I've seen them many times. It's been twelve years now. There's another artist named BukueOne who's been a great friend and help to me. Questlove and the Roots—I have photographed them five or six times. When I see them, it is personal, and they often ask me, "How's the project going?" But it's not a friendship thing where I can simply call them up. Given my age, I'm way out of this demographic. Yet, when I go to these shows and I walk into the theater now after all these years, there's so much love and so much feeling. It's really become a family. Everyone—even the kids from the shows—I don't know them, but they know me, because they see me show after show. It's terrific to walk in and have all the security guys always come over to me. They ask me about my pictures. They ask me what's going on. All the stage guys, all the sound guys—it is kind of a crazy. I don't know how this all happened, but these are my friends, and it's really quite wonderful.
FG: You've anticipated where I wanted to go next. Can you tell me more about the Sunshine Theater, and it being a kind of home for you? What's unique about the experience of photographing in Albuquerque—the type of audiences it draws and the dynamic in the crowd? It's not Brooklyn.
DS: It's not, and not many people have ever seen hip-hop shows and crowds that are not filled with black people. There's not a large black population in New Mexico. Thomas, from the Sunshine Theater has shown a remarkable commitment to the youth of New Mexico through his TooZany and his ZanyLyfe initiatives. Rather than the youth of Albuquerque having or maintaining gang associations, Thomas has created a ZanyLyfe association for youth of all races, backgrounds, and classes to rally around. He has created numerous opportunities for the youth to meet performing artists, offer opportunities to attend shows for free, and has basically made the Sunshine Theather and a few other venues throughout New Mexico a safe haven for all these hip hop kids. In terms of the hip-hop community, it's primarily—like the population itself—Anglo, Hispanic, and Native American. The Sunshine Theater is made up of the youth of Albuquerque. Yet, traditionally, hip-hop music and culture has been driven by the black community with its roots in the South Bronx. Hip-hop has often shed light on adverse conditions that affect certain ethnic groups in this country. The music has given voice to the social and political issues and focuses on the ills and inconsistencies of our culture of these times - whether it addresses housing or social services or medical facilities or living conditions or jobs, or outright racism. The largest hip-hop demographic is in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Detroit, Los Angeles, and Oakland. The music is principally about the black experience in these cities. However, of course there are large numbers of serious and extremely talented artists of all ethnicities. So, again, Albuquerque's kind of off that map, but it too has a serious core of artists and a consistent fan base.
FG: That said, you have photographed in other venues, in big cities in California and elsewhere. What's different about photographing away from the Sunshine Theater? What is it like to work at a venue like Coachella, in which you've got a much larger audience and a more urban audience?
DS: In terms of the audience and the vibe around the music, that's all the same wherever I have photographed. I've photographed in New York and L.A., and I've photographed at Coachella with tens of thousands of people. However, the real difference comes down to access. When I'm photographing outside of the Sunshine Theater, no one knows who I am. It's harder to move around. It's harder to photograph. When I went to Coachella to photograph, I was one of probably a hundred other photographers, and we were restricted to this one area in front of the stage. Fortunately, I knew some of the artists who were performing, so I was able to get a slightly better vantage point from which to photograph. If I didn't have the support of Thomas and the TooZany crew in Albuquerque, I could not have done the work that I've done. I feel there is an intimacy, an immediacy to the pictures that I'm able to make there that I couldn't make when I was at a place like Coachella. It's a very different experience, and it's no longer the type of personal work that I like to do. It's just taking pictures. Whereas, when I'm at the Sunshine, I have that same feeling in my body as when I have my 8 x10 camera set up. I feel like it's my work. I'm doing it for me. I can think. I'm not under any pressure. I'm not under any time pressure. I can do whatever I want. And those are the conditions that I need for that creative impulse.
FG: Let's move on to the color work that you’ve recently completed. After the exhibition “RECOGNIZE! Hip Hop and Contemporary Portraiture” at the National Portrait Gallery, you began to work in color. What prompted this change, and what were your thoughts about the resulting pictures? Are you working exclusively in color now in terms of this series?
DS: The show we did together was a real highlight for me as an artist. It was an important opportunity not just for me as an artist but specifically for this work. These photographs are quite different from most of the other work that I've done and that I continue to do. I'm not known as a hip-hop photographer. The show motivated and empowered me. At the same time, after I came to Washington and I experienced the show, I returned home kind of in turmoil. I came back with more questions than I went with, and rather than feel more secure, I came back feeling that it wasn't right, or perhaps that it wasn’t done. The biggest part of the experience in Washington was seeing Kehinde Wiley's work. I watched people walking into Kehinde's gallery with these giant, incredible paintings. The sheer size and the power and the color. Everyone in those rooms was animated. They were talking louder. They were laughing. There was an energy in those rooms. My work was different, and there was something that I had to acknowledge about size and color, something that I had avoided in my own work to date. I must admit that I come from a very conservative training. There's a great story that Beaumont used to tell. The students are looking at a group of mediocre color photographs, and the comment is made, "Well, if you can't make it good, make it red." The twenty-first century version of that remark is “If you can't make it good, make it big.” The truth is that I've always avoided big red things. I never wanted to fall into this notion that you had to rely on color or size. I was a straight, black-and-white photographer. That's my training. The most precious, most beautiful photographic experiences that I‘ve ever had have probably been viewing contact prints. Walker Evans' 35-millimeter contact prints or a Paul Strand 4 x 5 contact print or an Ansel Adams 8 x10 or an Edward Weston 8 x10—these are beautiful things. But then you go stand in front of a Kehinde Wiley painting, and it just put me in turmoil. There's an energy; there’s a power there. So then you have to dissect that. Is it the subject matter? Is it the size? Is it the color? Is it the frame? Is it the room? The color of the walls? There was so many things happening that, even though I couldn't put my finger on it, I returned from the visit to Washington feeling that I need to think this through.
FG: Did you have to teach yourself how to do color work? Was it rather intuitive, or was it a process of learning what color might do in photographing musical performance?
DS: I've been photographing consciously since 1969, and I have never really photographed in color other than taking snapshots, familypictures. But I've also been a photography teacher and a gallerist for over thirty years. I've had access to some of the greatest photographers of the twentieth century, including most notably Eliot Porter. My wife Janet Russek was Eliot's assistant, and we had a very close relationship with him. I consider Eliot the father of color photography, and I‘ve had many opportunities to talk with him and hear his philosophies about color photography. So, though I had never worked in color, I wasn't totally ignorant of it. I was aware of it. Ansel Adams was known to say things like "The most beautiful photograph is a black-and-white photograph in which you feel the color." Eliot thought that was ridiculous. He used color as I use tone. He was a master of subtlety in the way he worked with color, and the way he used color was the same way that I worked.
FG: Tell me a little bit more about the resulting pictures and what you're seeing that you like or that surprises you or that you feel is a good complement to the earlier black-and-white work.
DS: The black-and-white work is what I felt about hip-hop when I started the project. It was what I felt I wanted my work to do, what I wanted it to say in terms of showing a positive image and getting a feel for the music. I feel those prints have some of that angsty stuff and some of the speed, the movement, and the action. But here's the thing that I'm not certain about, but I think it's probably true: I think the color work actually shows it and says it all better. And in a way, the color work is more accurate, and I'm not talking about in a documentary sense. Also, after making larger prints, bigger than I‘ve never made, I look at them and go, "This is what it looks like, and this is what it feels like." I can't say that there's more or less of me in it, but the color work seems to ring truer regarding the experience of being at the concert, whereas the black-and-white work seems to be truer to me internally. Because of its size and color, it does get a lot more attention.
FG: Because color is exuberant. It's noisy. It's raucous.
DS: Right. I believe it's going to bring the positive attention to the genre that I hope my work will bring and show that it's not only a serious and viable art form, but it's filled with joy and dedication and as much seriousness as other art forms. And it's not someone with a gun or knife in their hand. It’s a very joyous experience.
FG: One last question around this idea of color: could you comment on a specific photograph or two from the recent past that you feel best exemplifies the noise and raucousness that you like in this work.
DS: I have a couple favorite photographs. First, let me say that it’s almost a joke here in New Mexico, but so many people write about why there are so many photographers in New Mexico. Everybody talks about the light and the clarity of the air at this altitude. I know that I'll look funny saying this, but there was a outdoor concert with the Wu-Tang Clan here in Santa Fe a few years ago. It was one of the earliest concerts that I shot in color, and I have to say that the light is so beautiful and so soft. And it's not just the photographs I love; it is the palette. At that same concert Public Enemy also performed, and I made a few images of Flava Flav and Chuck D. There's images from that show that are especially dear to me. I can't believe I'm saying this, but a lot of it has to do with New Mexico and the light. And another image that I really like is of a young artist named Yelawolf. I shot it from backstage looking out, and it's basically this small figure against a field of red. It's almost like a Rothko red to me. Here I am, having just finished saying, "If you can't make a good painting ….,” but that photograph really speaks to me. Again, it's the color that makes that work.
FG: Could talk about how the series as a whole compares to other photographic projects in which you've been engaged. In some respects the hip-hop work might seem like a departure. Do you think of it in that way? Or does it relate squarely with your larger photographic career?
DS: In terms of subject matter, it's a departure, but I think every new project is a departure. But it's not a departure at all in terms of me and my relationship to photography. I've never been a photographer like Lee Friedlander or Henri Cartier-Bresson who carries my camera around with me all the time. I've never been that kind of photographer. My work has always come from my personal experience. And it's never been driven by an assignment or a job. I can't be told what to photograph. One of the first major projects I did was photographing Miami Beach and the elderly Jewish community there. That whole book was about my grandfather and my relationship to my grandfather and the fact that it brought me to learning about old age and senior citizens and Judaism and immigration and social services. It took me to areas that I never expected, but the bottom line is that it started because of my relationship with my grandfather. And when he passed away I accelerated the work because he made me aware of so many things going on for people his age. Then there’s the Bisti project. I was very attracted to photographing the Bisti Badlands here in New Mexico. I didn't know anything about coal mining or conservation or outright environmental destruction. I started photographing there because I thought these formations were interesting. I didn't know where I was. I didn't know I was on the Navajo reservation or anything about the BLM. So, again, the project brought me to many important issues. Regarding the “I Ching” book that I did with Janet, I've been using the "I Ching" since I was sixteen years old. The second time I met Janet, I gave her a copy and I taught her how to use it. The fact we did a book on the "I Ching" is really about my relationship with Janet. And that whole project is really a visual diary. It’s almost like a visual companion to our thirtieth anniversary. I mean that whole book is about our life together. But, of course, it's also about the "I Ching." So my work needs to have that personal connection. For the most part, before I start photographing anything, I already have an emotional attachment to the subject matter.
FG: So would you say that this particular series is about your relationship with your son?
DS: I have to say that. It started that way, and in a way continues to be that. And he's one of the few people I have my serious conversations about the work with. For the last twelve years, he's been my main source for understanding who to photograph. I try to primarily photograph people who I consider positive artists, meaning artists who have a positive message for the youth of today. If someone's coming to Albuquerque, it was always Zac that I called. I think at this point I probably know more than he does. But certainly, for the beginning of the work, the first five or six years, Zac was my main decision-maker about whom I should photograph. The work is very much about the relationship between a father and his son. Zac primarily, but also some of Zac's friends whom I’m still very close with. I can proudly say I'm close with most of them still. And they visit me. I visit them. They're the ones who want to see what I'm doing. They want to see the work, and in some cases they have seen more of the work than anyone else. Anyway, most things that I've ever done with my photography have come out of a direct personal, emotional connection. And I have to say, when someone asks me to take a picture for them, I always screw it up. Someone may ask: "Could you go and take a picture of my house?" I'm terrible at that. I can't ever succeed when I'm photographing for someone else. I'm just terrible at it.