Dawit Samson - Artist Weekly Post #11

Nicolas Enriquez

1.) Nicolas Enriquez takes on the gang filled streets of Brooklyn to document one of America's largest gangs, Latin Kings. All the pictures in the series are in black and white to match with the seriousness of the environment. Enriquez combines contrasting colors to attract the viewer's eye. For instance in the third picture, the main subject has one a black and white shirt and he is in front of a white/light grey backdrop. He also uses aperture to help with the focus. He also filled the frame, giving the viewer's eye various places to look at instead of one thing. 

2.) Enriquez wanted to capture the reality of the gang member's life's. The use of black and white made it so that there was no color/life in the people's life. He shows the isolation of the members. In all three pictures theres a sense of loneliness. In the first picture the man is by himself in a dark room, looking out the window. The second picture shows two people, but they are divided, by the balloon. The last picture shows two people, but the focus is on the guy in the foreground smoking weed. This shows that even  though the gang is a group of people, they are still lonely. 

3.) I like the way Enriquez shot this series. He wasn't biased. He captured the true life of these gang members. His techniques helped with telling the story and thats one of the things I liked the most.