Anyone mildly familiar with Facebook would surely have come across photos from the Humans of New York (HONY) page; a news story liked by a friend, shared on a timeline, or name-tagged for a laugh or as a dose of friendly motivation. The HONY page inspired several similar projects, including Khaula Jamil’s Humans of Karachi and the philosophical Goats of Bangladesh page. However, unlike these instantly popular offshoots, HONY had not really been envisioned by its founder, Brandon Stanton, as the hugely celebrated photo-blog it is today. Stanton gave up a successful stock trading career amid intense speculations from his closest peers and relatives to do something more fulfilling. He did not really have a passion for photography, but found it mildly gratifying; more than the desk job he had left behind. The HONY project started off as untitled photos on Stanton’s Facebook profile, and evolved gradually from a “photography blog to a storytelling blog”. A few years later, the project has led to three publications and several trips around the world, including a recent one to Pakistan.
The first book, Humans of New York, is a collection of Stanton’s earliest photographs, often with generic captions, like the Today in Microfashion series featuring children in fancy or unusual clothing. It is more graphic, with minimal dialogue between the photographer and his subject, and the captions, if any, are mostly the author’s own interpretation of his subjects’ poses. Photos range from paparazzi-like zoomed in shots to more interactive ones, but the human aspect, the subject’s own contribution to the shot, remains limited. The photographs are arranged in a seemingly random order page after page, and do not follow any particular thematic or stylistic consistency. The second book, Humans of New York: Stories, contains more text and is more organised: groups of similarly themed photos follow one another without overemphasising a particular concept before moving on to the next one.
Across both books some of the most appealing stories and photographs feature elderly people. Sober or ludicrous, these senior citizens speak of valuable life lessons; of unrequited expectations and unrealistic aspirations, but also of regretful what-ifs. Photos of children are another highlight, with their spontaneous posing, uninhibited answers, and unrestrained ambitions; like taking up jobs as a princess hairdresser, or as Ironman. Flipping back and forth across the elderly and the younger generation, both books skim lifetimes within their pages — what happened between these two generations? What went wrong, what worked out, and what took unexpected turns? In answer to these existential questions the books present the young people of today; students, couples, artists, workers, single parents, lone wolves. The photos of the young people are accompanied mostly by anecdotes about their struggles and their proudest accomplishments. Their stories give the reader perspective on how the mundanities taken for granted by one person can be another’s inconceivable hopes, or how someone’s most meaningful personal struggles are in actuality only the trivialities of life for someone else.
On the immensely popular Humans of New York project as a social commentary of our times
It is within these photos that young readers, who arguably make up the largest chunk of Stanton’s readership, can discover an assortment of perspectives on life, not much different from what Harper Lee or George Eliot offered their readers decades or over a century ago. The stories run across a wide emotional range: from the uninhibited expression of people’s most tender, innocent desires (“‘I’m homeless and I’m an alcoholic. But I have a dream.’ ‘What’s that?’ ‘I wanna go fishing’”), to the realisation of practical realities (“Most of the time impermanence hits you when someone dies, but it can hit you in life as well”); to instances of philosophical and spiritual enlightening (“‘I’m telling you. Prayer works.’ ‘What’s a time that prayer didn’t work for you?’ ‘The time I didn’t pray’”).