New York Polaroids that only a true party person could capture

Date
11 June 2015

If Polaroid pictures, New York City, Andy Warhol and attractive naked girls don’t make for a heady aesthetic mix, we don’t know what does. Brace yourselves then for this lovely book, New York Polaroids 1976–1989, showcasing images by Swiss photographer and director Edo Bertoglio. While it’s all well and good that the images narrate his time hanging out with the likes of Madonna, Debbie Harry, Grace Jones and the aforementioned Mr Warhol, they also manage to capture time and place in the way only Polaroids and true party people can. Edo arrived in New York with Maripol, his artist, filmmaker and stylist wife, and he explains in the book the exact moment he realised he was utterly in love with the city. “Everything started between 5th and 34th Street, on a clear and cold afternoon… All of a sudden we hugged, with tears in our eyes, terrified by the metropolis, by our own loneliness and the lack of stable work,” he says.

“Attempting to overcome our own feelings, we walked right up to the 86th floor of the Empire State Building where the warmth of the light eventually welcomed us and showed to us the very essence of the city…It was certainly clear that New York was the only place where we wanted to stay. That city was going to be the luminous background of my photographs.”

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Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

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Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

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Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

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Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

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Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

Above

Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

Above

Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

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Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

Above

Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

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Edo Bertoglio: New York Polaroids 1976–1989

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Emily Gosling

Emily joined It’s Nice That as Online Editor in the summer of 2014 after four years at Design Week. She is particularly interested in graphic design, branding and music. After working It's Nice That as both Online Editor and Deputy Editor, Emily left the company in 2016.

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