Popo with cigarette burn from playing chicken under the BQE...

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Cianni photographed rollerbladers in the Latino enclaves of the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn over the course of a decade. The entire series, titled We Skate Hardcore and collected into a book in 2004, illustrates the skaters’ personal struggles and successes with relationships, family life and finding trouble-free places to skate. Broader issues of drugs, crime and poverty in their community, and the importance of skating in helping them transcend those challenges, also surface in Cianni’s document of the skaters’ daily lives. Popo, the rollerblader posing here, shows off the cigarette burn on his arm in a display of machismo that is undermined by the sensuality of his classic serpentine pose and his youthful appearance.

Keywords

Gelatin Silver
Portrait
Black and White
New York
Hat
Male
Documentary