Street photography is the perfect medium for capturing city life. Passers-by have long fascinated photographers who mingle among the crowds. At a time when social distancing is required and overcrowding seen as a health risk, especially for the elderly, the i series by Eamonn Doyle and Hardened by Jeff Mermelstein on the subject of city dwellers suddenly takes on a new meaning.

Born in Dublin, Eamonn Doyle (Ireland, 1969) studied painting and then photography, before starting a world trip, which allowed him to pursue his philosophy of being a “photographer of our planet”. In 1994, Doyle launched D1 Recordings in Dublin, with which he began to produce a unique and influential genre of electronic music. After devoting twenty years to music – he has published, worked, recorded, organized festivals and travelled all over the world – he decided to take up photography again and started taking photographs near his home in 2011. He quickly gained international recognition for his “Dublin trilogy” – i (2014), ON (2015) and End (2016). This series was then followed by K (2018), Made In Dublin (2019), and more recently O (2020), in which he photographed the Dublin suburb in which he grew up.

Born in New Jersey, Jeff Mermelstein (USA, 1957) studied at Rutgers College in his hometown and then in New York at the International Center of Photography, one of the most famous photography schools in the world. As a photographer, he has collaborated with prestigious magazines such as LIFE, the New Yorker and the New York Times Magazine. In the tradition of street photography, he extensively photographed New York, and notably produced a large series on September 11th and its consequences. His photographs are part of the collections of prestigious museums, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the George Eastman House in Rochester and the New York Public Library. Mermelstein has been teaching at the International Center of Photography since 1988. Following on from the #nyc series, his latest book, entitled Hardened, shows the close-up street photographs he took of text messages that New Yorkers send each other.