American photographer Rebecca Lepkoff is best known for capturing the energy and vibrancy of urban life in New York City's Lower East Side. She photographed street scenes, tenement buildings, and the people who lived in the neighbourhood. Her photographs often focused on the daily routines and struggles of working-class families and immigrant communities.
Rebecca Lepkoff Prints
Artist Biography
Born in Brooklyn, New York, Rebecca Lepkoff (1916 – 2014) grew up in a Jewish immigrant family and spent much of her childhood in the neighbourhood of Brownsville. Lepkoff became interested in photography at a young age, and in the 1930s she began to document life in the Lower East Side, where she lived and worked.
During World War II, Lepkoff worked as a machinist in a factory that produced military equipment. After the war, she continued to photograph the Lower East Side and became involved in the political and cultural life of the neighbourhood. She documented the changes that occurred in the area over the years, including the construction of public housing projects and the gentrification that began in the 1980s.
Lepkoff’s photographs have been exhibited in galleries and museums around the world, and her work has been included in numerous books and publications. In 2005, she was awarded the prestigious New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Photography. She continued to photograph the Lower East Side until her death in 2014 at the age of 97.
© Estate of Rebecca Lepkoff, Courtesy of Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York
