Silent Beaches, Untold Stories: New York City’s Forgotten Waterfront transports the reader into the extraordinary past and present embedded in New York City’s more than 600 miles of coastline through a stunning selection of rare photographs, history, new fiction and contemporary art.
Each of the ten chapters centers on one of New York City’s lesser-known waterfront spaces: Dead Horse Bay, where the pre-automobile city’s legions of horses once met their maker; Hart Island, New York’s still-active potter’s field, where over 800,000 of the city’s unclaimed dead have been laid to rest; and Sandy Ground, one of the earliest free black communities in the nation, made prosperous through oystering and strawberry farming.
Elizabeth Albert's historical texts and striking images resonate with Underwater New York's selected new fiction and poetry, setting a stage where history, image and fiction coalesce into a powerful and haunting experience. Silent Beaches features the work of internationally known and notable contemporary artists and writers, including Joel Meyerowitz, Mary Mattingly, Carrie Mae Weems, Spencer Finch, Susan Choi, Nelly Reifler, Ravi Howard, Antoine Wilson and others.