Sharon Smith, Camera Girl16 Images
In 1980, the NYC club scene was at its height. A diverse cast of artists, musicians, dancers, and designers rubbed shoulders (or more) at the likes of the Mudd Club and Studio 54. Andy Warhol. Debbie Harry. Iggy Pop. Basquiat. Madonna. This was the birthplace of New Wave, house music, hip-hop, graffiti culture, and much more. As Honey Dijon writes in the intro to Camera Girl: “All of it coalesced in the same moment – all of these atoms colliding with each other – and it was fucking magical.”
Sharon Smith, whose photos are collected in Camera Girl, arrived on the scene that September. “I was 29 [and] I needed a job,” she says, so she started selling $3 Polaroids at a “rock disco” in the East Village called the Ritz. “I pitched myself as the ideal person to add to the burgeoning scene unfolding there. Little did I know that I was starting a long cruise through Manhattan’s clubs, and never in a million years did I expect to make a career out of it!”
But Smith did just that. From 1980 to 1989, she chronicled NYC nightlife with a trusty SX-70 camera, getting up close and personal with David Bowie, Grace Jones, and countless other cultural icons. “After several months at the Ritz, I went on to work at the Savoy, the Red Parrot, Studio 54, Roseland Ballroom, Merlyn’s, 4D, Area, Palladium, Mars, New York, New York, and others that I can’t recall,” she says. From 11pm to 5am, she adopted the persona of a camera girl from a 1940s B-movie, dressing in slinky black dresses and calling herself Rose. “‘Would you like a photograph?’ I cooed to the patrons as I walked around.”
In Camera Girl, published by IDEA December 5, these photos form a rare document of history in the making. Some subjects strike a pose, accustomed to the limelight, while some stare the camera down with a cigarette hanging out of their mouth. Others are drenched in sweat from a long night of partying, their eyes glazed or hidden behind a pair of dark sunglasses.
“During those years, NYC was an edgy place, and going out, dressing up, and dancing was the thing to do to have a good time, let off steam and meet people,” says Smith. “There was a kind of tribal feeling when the music and the dancing really worked together. [It] was the energy that kept me interested.” So why did she finally call it quits in 1989? It’s simple really, she says: “I needed to start going to sleep at a decent hour!”
Below, Sharon Smith tells us more about her years as the go-to camera girl of the NYC club scene, from their unique hazards, to the emergence of vibrant subcultures that define art and culture to this day.
What drew you to the NYC club scene in the first place?
Sharon Smith: A few months before I went to The Ritz, I worked as a prom photographer at the Copacabana, where I used an old-fashioned press camera to take souvenir photographs of teenage couples dressed up for the night of their lives. Every night, the boss holed up in a closet, dimly lit by a red safelight, sniffing photo-chemicals and running prints through a cheap, antiquated processor. When the shot was finally printed, still stinking of fixer, I’d stick it in a white frame and sell it to the prom kids – a souvenir they would cherish forever, or at least for a few days.
This process was time-consuming and outdated, and I already knew there was a better way to create photographs on the spot. Even before moving to the city, I had taken my SX-70 out to Coney Island in 1977, where I walked around making pictures of the vibrant life of the beach and boardwalk that coexisted with the seedy atmosphere. So it was a natural progression to the ‘camera girl’ in a club, where instant image making technology was a perfect fit! Music videos were just coming out, people were excited about fashion and art, and the Ritz was the perfect place to take instant pictures.
Can you sum up the atmosphere at that time – what did a night’s work look like for you?
Sharon Smith: The rooms were filled with smoke, loud music and massive video screens. People dressed to impress. It was a visual feast. There was this sense of possibility that was electric. Every night was Halloween! I did everything I could to maintain my energy, so my perception was sharp, staying away from drugs and alcohol until the very end of the night, when I allowed myself a drink or two. Once I finally hit my bed, I often slept for 12 hours.
Saturday nights could be particularly tough, with very few breaks. At Roseland Ballroom, from 11pm to midnight, I would catch the last hour of the ballroom-dancing crowd, who came in from the far reaches of Brooklyn and Queens. Around midnight, the clientele changed completely, and the hip-hop kids flooded in. Before the party really got going, I would sneak out of the club for a couple of hours and go to the latest action or horror movie in Times Square, just to stay awake, since I usually sold more photos the later it got. Then I would head back around 2am, reinvigorated by watching The Terminator or The Toxic Avenger, and start taking pictures again.
Were there any dicey moments?
Sharon Smith: Working in the clubs wasn’t always safe, though the danger could come in odd ways. Early on, I considered getting out of the business for good, when I had to go to the emergency room after someone stepped on my foot with their six-inch stiletto. My instincts saved me from worse things though. More than once, I left in time to avoid a dangerous situation, like a shootout that made the NY Post the next day.
Early on, I considered getting out of the business for good, when I had to go to the emergency room after someone stepped on my foot with their six-inch stiletto – Sharon Smith
How does it feel to look back on those years, collected in one place?
Sharon Smith: Oh my god. It’s so thrilling to see them all in one place. They provoke so many memories, and I see them with wonder and affection, as they are and were meant to be – focused souvenirs of an era gone forever, with added poignancy coming from all the hardships that New York City has faced since that time, from 9/11 to the COVID-19 pandemic. These Polaroids were perceptions grabbed from my experience and preserved in plastic, taken at a time when ‘instant’ went from five to two minutes.
The Aids crisis is a looming presence throughout the work. How do you think art, like the photos in Camera Girl, can help preserve or celebrate what was lost?
Sharon Smith: In my humble opinion, the best art channels something that anyone can recognize and relate to. When I look at, or listen to, the work of the great artists and musicians from that time period, the energy and emotion of that time is carried in the work, as a kind of transmission. I aspire to do that in my own work, to communicate an emotional truth that might be anchored in time, but is universal.
As for these particular photos… the creativity expressed in these artifacts from the 1980s was an explosion of vitality and life force that we must learn from, honour, celebrate, and continue. It happened in the face of the ultimate unknown, death. That energy is still here. As Honey Dijon said in the intro to my book: “… As long as we’re talking about something from the past, it’s still with us in the present. These pictures hold my history. But they also hold my today and my tomorrow.”
You capture a club scene that’s very localised, intimate, and unfiltered, in a way that feels impossible today. How do you think things like camera phones or the internet have impacted clubbing, or counterculture as a whole?
Sharon Smith: It’s human to want to communicate and share our experiences. That won’t change, no matter how technology develops. Instagram itself was predicated on the format and instant shareability of Polaroids. But with our phones making everyone a photographer, who can immediately share images and videos with people sitting right next to them as well as thousands of miles away, there are new concerns. Authenticity, performative behavior, and privacy issues to name a few…
No matter where one is in the political spectrum, it’s impossible not to feel that we are in a time of instability. Personally, I see many possibilities for developing counterculture for the rest of the decade. Sometimes difficult social conditions can be good for culture. Apartheid in South Africa produced fantastic music. The blues flourished in the Deep South during the 20th century. The groundbreaking psychedelic and protest music of the late 1960s was the soundtrack for the political demonstrations that eventually helped stop the Vietnam War. It will be interesting to see how present and upcoming technology will aid culture in supporting our collective humanity’s expansion of consciousness. It’s my fervent hope that it doesn’t go in the opposite direction.
It requires some real bravery to approach cultural icons like Bowie or Grace Jones. What advice would you give to younger photographers who want to follow in your footsteps?
Sharon Smith: The cultural context was very different. Not many celebrities hang out with the regular folks at clubs anymore. So, there’s that. And yes, sometimes I was a bit starstruck, but if you were like me and loved these people and their music, would you miss an opportunity to take a photo of them in a somewhat relaxed moment? Of course not! You would overcome your fear, put on your best smile and politely ask: ‘Could I take a photo of you?’
I love photography. I love music and art and culture. If anyone wants to follow in my footsteps, my only advice is to follow what you love. Be fearless but also kind in your creative pursuits. And learn Tai Chi! It will keep you healthy and sane.
Camera Girl is available now via IDEA.
