BLM PROTESTS

Like many, George Floyd’s murder compelled me to grab my camera and hit the streets of NYC. I photographed these early days of the Black Lives Matter protests on foot, but following the city's curfew, I joined the weekly “Justice Rides” with a local bicycle protest group. At our peak, it was reported that we were 15,000 of us on one ride. Each Saturday, I had the perspective of both documenting and protesting at the same time. Many photos in this collection were taken while riding a bike as we cycled through every borough during this heightened moment of social reckoning. Among us was a virtual army of volunteers who deftly and courageously used their bikes to block off traffic, allowing the rest of us to overtake the city’s streets, highways, and bridges. Because of this, I could capture iconic NYC from a vantage point that would have been impossible to photograph had we not “taken back our streets.” Clashes with the police were common; on foot, we were often “kettled in” but on bikes, for the most part, we were left alone, despite ongoing police presence all around and always a helicopter or two loudly trailing above us in the sky. Our goal was to disrupt.