A panorama looking northeast across Ground Zero made two weeks after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Meyerowitz assembled the image from multiple frames he had made on the ninth floor of the World Financial CenterJoel Meyerowitz
Joel Meyerowitz was the only photographer with regular access to Ground Zero in the weeks and months after 9/11. As part of the November 2010 TimeFrames issue, TIME commissioned Meyerowitz to travel back to Ground Zero and revisit some of the locations in his seminal work,Aftermath: World Trade Center Archive.
We interviewed him after the shoot and asked him to compare his experience and the pictures he made in 2001-02 to the ones he made for TIME.
A panorama looking northeast across Ground Zero made two weeks after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Meyerowitz assembled the image from multiple frames he had made on the ninth floor of the World Financial CenterJoel MeyerowitzSerendipity allowed Meyerowitz to reproduce a shot of the sun glinting off the Millennium Hotel that he originally made on almost the same day in November nine years priorJoel Meyerowitz; Joel Meyerowitz for TIMELooking northeast from the center of Ground Zero, the chaos of destruction near the North Tower in October 2001 contrasts with the clean and somber design of the memorial's reflecting poolJoel Meyerowitz; Joel Meyerowitz for TIMEAssembled panoramas looking northeast from the southern end of the site show the emptiness of the pit in February 2002 (top) and the flurry of construction in November 2010Joel Meyerowitz; Joel Meyerowitz for TIMEMeyerowitz likened moving around the site in 2001 to "walking through a field of swords"Joel MeyerowitzFrom a similar vantage point, Meyerowitz made this photograph shortly after white oaks had been planted on the site as part of the 9/11 memorialJoel Meyerowitz for TIMEMeyerowitz framed the Deutsche Bank building (with flag) and the "ghost train" in this shot made from below street level, looking south, in February 2002Joel MeyerowitzLooking from the same vantage point at street level in November, across the site of the new transit hub, Meyerowitz saw the flag hanging from the crane and recalled the shot he had made almost nine years earlier. Two tridents from the original World Trade Center construction appear in their temporary location at right — they will be permanently installed as part of the memorialJoel Meyerowitz for TIMEA lone worker rakes through debris near the west slurry wall in May 2002 (left). More than eight years later, a worker inside the north reflecting pool looks over the edge into the second recessed poolJoel Meyerowitz; Joel Meyerowitz for TIME
