Here's to rad photographer (with a name
to fit her sass), Flo Fox, who captures thought-provoking, often
humorous images of New York street life in spite of a significant
visual impairment, multiple sclerosis, and lung cancer.
If you were in New York recently and
saw a purple-haired woman riding around the streets in a motorized
wheelchair, camera around her neck, care assistant by her side,
chances are you came across Flo Fox. Maybe she stopped in the middle
of the street and urged her aide to grab the camera before the
opportunity disappeared, describing the shot she wanted as her aide
pointed the lens and snapped the photo. Perhaps she was even on a
street corner, mixing cement so she could repair New York's broken
sidewalks herself, since the city would not. That's her
personality—big, audacious, and quirky, just like the city that
seems to supply her with unending inspiration.
Fox has always been a little eccentric;
she was orphaned as a teenager and ended up hanging out at Studio 54
in the same social crowds as Andy Warhol and photographers Andre
Kertesz and Lisette Model. Fox claims she was raised by what would
become the main focus of her photography: “I got my education on
the streets. That's why I can take naughty photos.”
Fox was born blind in one eye and is
now almost completely blind in the other. This early blindness is
partly what drew her to photography. Fox says that being born blind
in one eye was perfect for photography. She never had to close an eye
to take a photo, and she never had to change three dimensions to a
flat plane. It made sense, so when she was 26, she used her first
paycheck to buy a camera.
Fox still takes photos and exhibits
them—she even has permanent collections in both the Smithsonian and
the Brooklyn Museum—but now she takes her photographs in a
different way. Since her triplegia, caused by MS, makes it impossible
for her to hold a camera, Fox instructs her aides to take the photos
for her. She says that maybe one in ten turn out exactly as she'd
hoped, and others just need cropping here or there. She is happy that
she's been able to take so many photos.
“You have to take a look at what you
can do with your life to keep your interests going.”
Take a look at this nice
mini-documentary and let me know what you think!
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