Brian Cregan
ON OFF HALSTED
38 pages
Hardcover
If Chicago is a city of neighborhoods, then how the streets connect and divide them play an intrinsic role in their definition. Running North to South on the city grid for 38 miles, Halsted is one of the city’s oldest and most historic streets. ‘On Off Halsted’, is the result of a series of walks that I took during the Fall and Winter of 2010, soon after my arrival in Chicago. It stems from a desire to explore the city and the communities that shape it. History, family, politics and architecture all coalesce and engage in transformation on the city street. It is a barometer of migration, work and the economics that drive people to begin new lives far from home. In making these photographs I have looked for traces of the past and cultural signifiers of diversity that characterize Chicago as an archetypal modern city.
