Maï Lucas: All Eyes on Me

For Paris-based photographer Maï Lucas (born 1968), All Eyes On Me is a long-term labor of love. Shot between 1990 and 2010, her pictures capture the hip-hop and street culture of Afro-American and Latinx New York City: from Coney Island and Jones Beach to Harlem and East New York. Those were the years in which young people of color turned against preexisting codes and invented new styles in order to express their identities and their pride artistically. It is as if they were out to supplant the established hip-hop phenomenon—which had become too much about wealth and luxury—with a counterculture of their own. Approaching her subjects with respect, empathy and love, Lucas produces photographs of candid authenticity, grace and deep humanity. She brings out the beauty of a youth scene whose creativity was expressed in school, out of school, on the streets, on the beaches, in nightclubs and more.