Photographer Johnny Cirillo Gets NYC’s Fashion at Its Best: Unpredictable
For all of its polar opposites — whether it’s about the myriad walks of lives, backgrounds, class divide, uptown or downtown, bagels or hot dogs — it’s comical how New York City, the Big Apple that has been munched, digested, and interpreted by many, can still be such an impartial diplomat to its citizens’ choice of fashion. It always has an additional space for that piece of clothing you just purchased after a crowdsourcing help from a fellow human you saw walking down the street.
According to the United States Census Bureau, as you read this piece there are roughly 8.8 million people living in NYC, minus the rodents. Maybe you’re lucky to not live in New York, or maybe you just idealise yourself there after reading Just Kids (great book by - watching anything by Scorcese or binge watching Sex and the City. Let us be honest, we all wanna a bite of what this city has to offer. As ubiquitous as its aesthetic bravado is with its skyscrapers and brownstones accompanied by a nonchalant attitude towards tourists, NYC’s penchant for fashion has always been one of its most elusive and appealing trademarks.
It seems that after two exhaustive years of a pandemic and by being geographically excluded from the fashion capitals on other side of the Atlantic pond and thus not being directly tied to ideals of european luxury - unless you’re from that simulacrum of a land called The Hamptons - guaranteed this city’s lackadaisical disposition to say “i don't give two ***** ” and just decided to evolve its own lack of rules about style. Unlike any other fashion cornucopia with its regional delights - Paris has the Diors and Chanels; Italy the Guccis and Versaces; London the Burberrys and McQueens - NYC, well, it can only count on its people and what they can bring to the many fashionable avenues around the city. Its style is eclectic, fun, messy, unique, sometimes avant-garde, hard to pin down and painfully remarkable.
Don’t take my word for it? Just pay a visit to its five boroughs or ask anyone, whether a local or a foreigner, to describe the city’s sense of style. A different response will emerge every time. Another way I can prove my point is by convincing you to pay a visit to the Instagram of the photographer Johnny Cirillo. Born and raised in NYC, Johnny has been photographing pretty much his whole life. ‘Watching New York’, a project he has been working on since 2017, has gained massive attention since 2020 when we were all but underdressed at home in sweatpants eating banana bread craving the times when we could go out and snap unrealistic pics of our lives, being our outfits the perfect organza percolating it and giving its ethereal vibe. Obviously it was before BeReal became a thing.
Also known as ‘The People’s Paparazzi’, Johnny captures candid moments on the streets of NYC, and that is precisely the main allure of his work: taking fashion out of magazines, runaways or shops and letting flow through the city. As comical and unnerving as it can be, even though the subjects of his camera are ordinary, the photos are not. Beside the fresh aroma of rubbish, there’s something in the metropolitan air that transforms anyone, even the people of Wall Street, into the role of a main character on a series produced by Netflix aiming at Gen Z and befittingly set for Pinterest moodboards. I bear no guilt in this pleasure though I’m gatekeeping mine.
Perusing Cirillo’s Instagram feed is like an impossible task of foraging for your favourite character for inspiration and to save you from boredom. People are out. As of late, mine is the girl in the third picture in a full bubblegum pink ensemble. One thing I’m grateful for Johnny’s work? He gives contemporary fashion back to where it started: the streets and the diverse set of people that decorates it. Plus, ever since I’ve been following his work for almost one year no one has been photographed dressed up as a character in the American export version of ‘The Sopranos’ for Brits called ‘Peaky Blinders' and thinking it's the epitome of menswear fashion. The world has been healing indeed. One thing I ask of him? Get Fran Lebowitz on that feed!
Last summer, Johnny and I hopped on a Zoom call to chat about how photography started in his life, his relation with fashion, the most stylish places in NYC, how his work has been an imagetic ode to this city and an upcoming book in 2023. Keep your eyes peeled for the latter.
When did you start your work as a photographer?
Probably when I was a young teenager, like 13. My mum gave me an old camera to bring to school and that was my introduction into enjoying photography, taking pictures and getting them developed, bringing them back and showing them to my friends in school. It then led me into highschool where I took photography classes and after school I built myself a dark room in my parent’s basement and developed my own pictures down there for a bunch of years until digital came out probably in 2003-2004 and then I switched to it.
My mum really got me into it back in the day. Thank goodness. She was really into it in highschool and she showed me her techniques, her black and white techniques as far as colouring pictures with oils etc. She’s just very artistic and always has a way of making things really fun and I think she knew from a young age that I wasn’t into school. So she taught me a lot about art and let me explore with some of her old pieces of equipment and stuff like that.
Does she influence your work nowadays?
For sure! She runs circles around me still. She does something artistic everyday which I can’t even say for myself; I sometimes need a break, I have a little kid at home.
My mum goes to the beach everyday and finds treasures on the beach every time; rocks, shells, glass and she makes all kinds of things out of them. She sews her own clothing, makes jams and foods. She’s never stopping; she’s the greatest. She inspires me still, 100%.
How would you define your style as a photographer?
I like to believe - even though I didn't go to school, so I won't claim that I’m - but I pretend that I’m a photojournalist, I like to capture things that are really happening in the street. I like candid moments.
My professional career really started off photographing candid moments of weddings, engagement parties, events and even newborns. Of course I had some posed photographs but the best material always came from the candid moments: when they were changing a diaper or laughing because somebody slipped or whatever.
My wife once said to me “I think your candid work is your best work” and I guess I leaned into that early on. That’s how Watching New York started because it’s all candid. I like to think I’m a decent candid photojournalist.
And do you think that is one of the reasons why ‘Watching New York’ got so big? Because it is a candid and unexpected moment?
I think it’s because people see themselves in the people, in the subjects. We can all find ourselves in some of these subjects, which is a little bit different than looking at a magazine where it’s curated.
I’ve always growed up thinking “Would that look good on me?”. It’s refreshing to see regular people, like you and I, pulling off some really stunning outfits and I believe it gives people a little bit of confidence. Maybe that is what made it fly.
What I like about your photos is that they give back the power of fashion to the masses, to normal people which is really exciting to see the creativity of those that are not in a fashion magazine or in the runaway.
I love the fashion magazines, I don’t have anything against them at all and I like to mix that in now and then. I think there’s a place for all of it.
Why did you start taking pictures of people in New York City?
I did a lot of personal photography projects; almost every month I picked something different whether it was photographing in my grandma’s garden or old posters around New York City. Or even, if you have ever been to NYC you know, almost every building you go to there’s a front door that you open then you walk into this little tiny vestibule and then there’s a second door that you open. All these vestibule have a different beautiful, ornate tilework and I’d take pictures of that too.
When Bill Cunningham passed away - the legendary New York Times photographer - in June, 2016 I decided to go out and visit where he went to take photos. I never knew him but I always really loved his work so much and how he did until he was so old and never stopped. I thought that was so beautiful.
Yeah, and his work is so emblematic of NYC.
Sure, you nailed it.
So I went out and did that for one day but it was a little intimidating but I did enjoy it. On the first day it wasn't so great, I wasn't thrilled but when I got home my wife thought they looked pretty nice. I went back out the next day, did it again and here we are.
I became obsessed with it and went out all day until night and fell in love with it. I did it for years before anybody even noticed it on Instagram, I was just posting everyday with no audience whatsoever.
And you have always lived in New York City?
My dad is from New Jersey and my mum is from Queens. I was born in Queens but we moved out to Long Island for school. After highschool I came to Brooklyng in 2003. We’ve been in New York our whole lives.
Do you consider yourself a fashion photographer?
That’s a tricky question…
I’m asking you this because I’ve worked with some photographers before and sometimes they tend to dismiss the work of fashion photographers and I’d like to know how you feel about it.
I think it’d be odd not to say that I’m a fashion photographer although I don’t do any studio work; I’ve shot runaway shows maybe only 2 times in my life, that is not my thing.
Am I a fashion photographer? Yes and no, I just can’t put a label on it. It would be weird for me to say that I’m not because that is the way I make my living but also when I come home I take an equal amount of pictures in my house of my kid, my dog and my wife. I’m always photographing.
This whole entire wall is all made up of group shots that I’ve taken over the years, I love big group shots. There’s a lot of things that I like to do besides street fashion. I’m just a photographer.
Do you become friends with the people you photograph?
Yeah, big time! I’m really good friends with a lot of them. It’s been one of the most fulfilling aspects of the job, building relationships with people. I’ve lived in this city for so many years and I’ve made more friends since I started this project than I have for the whole rest of my life probably.
I believe that people that are dressed up in a certain way like to talk and they are interested when you stop them to discuss what they are wearing, where they are going and what they are up to. Depending on how your conversation goes you just vibe with them and have a great time and you just keep up with them.
When I go to a familiar neighbourhood like I was yesterday, every 5 minutes someone would stop and we’d chat, have fun and goof around. They also keep me company sometimes for 10 to 20 minutes on the street while I’m shooting. Some of them have become characters on the page and people look forward to seeing them and what they will be wearing.
How would you define the NYC style?
I’d say it is experimental, ever-changing and it’s always on the frontlines of what is to come. Sometimes I will see something for the first time and a month or two will go by and I start to see it again then there will be a fashion show and I will see it again, and then it blows up all over the world.
But it can also be high end if you go to certain places but also creative and unique in other places. I like to stay in Brooklyn and Williamsburg a lot because there’s a lot of creative artists and people that are thrifting their clothes.
When I go to Downtown Manhattan I see a lot of designer pieces which I also appreciate. So it’s a real melting pot of what’s going on in the world… all the walks of lives, ethnicities, backgrounds, religions and it’s nice to experience what everybody is doing.
Where are the best spots in the city to take pictures of stylish people?
I love shooting in Williamsburg on Bedford Avenue… there’s a lot of people, a lot of artists and great thrift shops.I also enjoy going to Soho, specifically by Fanelli Café on 94th Prince St, where one can find a mixture of artists and well-off people.
What I’ve always really liked is just people that look really great in a New York scene. It’s not about how much it costs or what they are wearing. I like seeing people that are unique and that express themselves in a positive way. It has always been about that.
Do you ever plan to release a book?
Yes! A book is in the works… fingers-crossed it’s coming out with a really great publisher.
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