Photographer Harold Feinstein, the unsung chronicler of Coney Island
He found fame in his teens with images of his native New York, then lost it again. A new film and show aim to give him the recognition he deserves
It began with a great outpouring of images. At 15, Harold Feinstein borrowed his neighbour’s Rolleiflex camera and started shooting scenes of everyday life on the streets and boardwalks of south Brooklyn. The year was 1946 and Coney Island, where Feinstein grew up, was still popular with New Yorkers, who flocked to its amusement parks and beaches in the summertime to let their hair down.
Feinstein found compelling dramas wherever he looked: the sergeant in full uniform flirting with an older woman on the boardwalk; the gypsy girl with a dirty face loitering by the carousel. In one shot, a man with a pencil moustache and a “bad luck” tattoo glowers menacingly down at the pint-sized photographer. In another, a cluster of sunbathing teenagers, including a radiantly smiling girl with a radio, bask in the camera’s attention.