In Our Frame
Self Portrait on Medium Format,
Coney Island 2024
The Photobooth as a Portal for Memory and Resistance in Coney Island
In Our Frame is a community-based visual and archival project rooted in Coney Island, Brooklyn, that reimagines the photobooth as a vital site for memory-making, resistance, and self-representation. Historically, photobooths have offered an affordable, quick, and accessible means for individuals, especially those in marginalized communities, to create personal imagery. Scholars of photography and visual culture increasingly recognize vernacular photographs, including photobooth strips, as essential archival materials that capture everyday lives and identities often excluded from mainstream historical narratives.
Developed in direct response to the proposed casino development and ongoing gentrification in Coney Island, this project centers Black and immigrant residents whose stories are frequently overlooked or erased in institutional archives and urban planning. The casino proposal reflects a broader pattern of speculative redevelopment in New York City, where economic interests routinely eclipse community needs, leading to displacement and cultural erasure.
Through participatory portraiture, oral histories, and vernacular photography, In Our Frame builds a living, place-based archive shaped by the community itself. The project explores the role of visual anthropology in grassroots historical preservation and self-representation. It asks: How can accessible, everyday image-making practices, when recontextualized through collaborative ethnographic methods, serve as tools for cultural self-determination, historical reflection, and collective memory?
Engaging with ongoing debates around authorship, participatory documentation, and ethical representation, this project argues for an expanded understanding of visual anthropology not merely as a mode of observation but as an active, reflexive, justice-oriented practice. Ultimately, In Our Frame offers a model for how cultural workers can meaningfully intervene in the interpretation and preservation of marginalized histories, especially within communities confronting speculative development and cultural displacement.
Coney Island residents visit the community photobooth at the Carey Gardens Cornerstone on Surf Avenue, coming together to share their stories and see themselves centered in the frame.
beneath the summer sky: reflections from coney island
mixed-media animation
2024
beneath the summer sky
by jewel champbell
watching the summer sunrise,
an orange glow before my eyes.
my toes kiss the sand, and the ocean sings
my favorite song, all morning long.
oh, but wait,
let me tell you about summer at noon-
oh, that's my favorite tune.
the sun's shine grows and grows,
and the people come and go,
back and forth.
summer at night,
so peaceful, the air feels light.
the ocean never sleeps,
reflecting moonlight on every tide.
my favorite thing is watching the amusement park lights,
shining like the sun at noon
and the summer sunrise, so bright.