--- description: Arlene Gottfried chronicled life the way she saw it, thriving on the energy on the streets. She died at 66 on Aug. 8 title: Remembering Arlene Gottfried: Legendary New York City Street Photographer image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb7d53c89dcdb6b66/698892595f570f4354b20d6c/arlene-gottfried-mothers-day.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [World](/section/world/) ## World Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [LightBox](/tag/time-section-lightbox/) ## LightBox Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Remembering Arlene Gottfried: Legendary New York City Street Photographer  by [Paul Moakley](/author/paul-moakley/)  ## Paul Moakley Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Aug 8, 2017 10:57 PM CUT  Three generations of mothers Three generations of mothersArlene Gottfried  by [Paul Moakley](/author/paul-moakley/)  ## Paul Moakley Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Aug 8, 2017 10:57 PM CUT Arlene Gottfried chronicled life the way she saw it, thriving on the energy on the streets, roaming and recording everything she felt through a deeply empathetic and loving lens. “My mother used to say ‘Arlene– just don’t wander!’ Then I started wandering,” she told TIME in 2011, “but I got a camera because it gave it a little more meaning…a life of wandering is really what it all is.” Gottfried, who died at 66 on Aug. 8 of complications from cancer, according to her family, was born and raised in Brooklyn with her sister, Karen, who became a muse for much of her work, and a surprisingly camera shy brother, the comedian Gilbert Gottfried. After attending the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York, she began working in the world of commercial photography at a time that she would describe as “male-dominated.” She earned a living but eventually began freelancing for publications like _The New York Times Magazine_, _Fortune_, _LIFE_ and _Newsweek_ _,_ but her passion for looking always drew her back to life to on the streets and to the people to whom she was closest.  Photographer Arlene Gottfried documented the vibrant Puerto Rican community in New York City. As a shy, young Jewish girl with a head of curly hair, her identity was ambiguous and could fit in anywhere. She always carried a camera and as she got older, she carried a point-and-shoot in her purse. Over the span of three decades, Gottfried published five books that taken together can serve as photo albums of her life. _The Eternal Light_ (Dewi Lewis, 1991) looked at a choir she first saw at a Gospel Fest in an abandoned gas station on New York’s Lower East Side. Gottfried eventually joined the group and discovered she could sing. She even had the title “singing photographer” printed on her business card. The second book, _Midnight_ (powerHouse Books, 2003), is a study of a man, named Midnight, struggling with mental illness in a brilliant sequence that shows the many faces we reveal in pictures throughout our lives. [_Sometimes Overwhelming_](http://time.com/3559712/when-eccentricity-reigned-portraits-from-a-vanishing-new-york/ "undefined") (powerHouse Books, 2008) looks back at her early black-and-white work on the street. [_Bacalaitos and Fireworks_](http://time.com/3778057/bacalaitos-and-fireworks-by-arlene-gottfried/ "undefined") (powerHouse Books, 2011) is a love letter to New York’s Puerto Rican community inspired by its poetry and music. ### Bacalaitos and Fireworks by Arlene Gottfried  All photographs from the book Bacalitos and Fireworks by Arlene Gottfried. Classroom Arlene Gottfried  Skyline from Avenue D Arlene Gottfried  Summer Afternoon Arlene Gottfried  Latin Disco Arlene Gottfried  Communion Arlene Gottfried  Mikey, Fort Apache Arlene Gottfried  Miguel Algarin eulogizes Ritchie Cruz Arlene Gottfried  Kissing Arlene Gottfried  Amores Arlene Gottfried  Push Ups Arlene Gottfried  Cuchifrito, Vista Alegre Arlene Gottfried  Johnny Cintron, 1980 Arlene Gottfried  Johnny Cintron, 1991 Arlene Gottfried  La Canta Gallo Arlene Gottfried  Happy Birthday Arlene Gottfried  Birthday Party Arlene Gottfried  El Dia de San Juan Bautista, Wards Island Arlene Gottfried  Bethesda Fountain, Puerto Rican Day Parade Arlene Gottfried  Puerto Rican Day Parade Arlene Gottfried When placing Gottfried’s work in the history of street photography in New York, you would find her on the periphery when others photographed the extremes. Looking beyond the standard tropes, she focused on neighborhoods and communities and families that might otherwise have disappeared from view. Her subjects are consistently depicted with a sense of intimacy and curiosity, strangers are indistinguishable from friends. In every frame, no matter how tough the subject matter, there is never a sense of detached irony or coolness. Whether it was her mother dying in bed, or a homeless person on the sidewalk, she approached them with the same careful empathy and directness. Whenever Gottfried spoke about her photographs and books she was direct, unpretentious, yet maintained an innocent sense of curiosity. “I think somewhere I always thought of doing a book in my very naive approach to photography,” she told me in 2011\. “I didn’t really study a lot of photographers and I didn’t know much of anything \[about\] getting a book out there—part of me is still very much that way. I’m good at taking the pictures and putting them in some order. For me it’s a way of concluding something.” ### When Eccentricity Reigned: Portraits From a Vanishing New York  Angel and Woman on Boardwalk, Brighton Beach, 1976 Arlene Gottfried  Hassid and Jewish Bodybuilder, 1980 Arlene Gottfried  Riis Nude Bay, Queens, 1980 Arlene Gottfried  Third Avenue Shopping, El Barrio, 1978 Arlene Gottfried  Pituka at Bethesda Fountain, 1977 Arlene Gottfried  Guy with Radio, East 7th Street, 1977 Arlene Gottfried  Wolverine Camper, 1979 Arlene Gottfried  Veterans Day Parade, 1978 Arlene Gottfried  Doorway in SoHo, 1980 Arlene Gottfried  Johnny Cintron, Lower East Side, 1980 Arlene Gottfried  Little Fonzi, 1980 Arlene Gottfried  No Wheels, El Barrio, 1978 Arlene Gottfried  Isabel Croft Jumping Rope, Brooklyn, 1972 Arlene Gottfried  Doorway in Brooklyn, 1980 Arlene Gottfried In a final interview with TIME about her last book [_Mommie_](http://time.com/4322235/mother-day-three-generations-vintage-photo/ "undefined") (powerHouse 2016), Gottfried said, “the aging and getting ill and passing away, it’s part of life.” Gottfried’s most personal book to date, _Mommie_ is an epic compilation of the more than 40 years she spent documenting her mother, grandmother and sister’s lives in New York City. In a book about aging that ends with a birth, her photographs show how the cycle of life continues. She proudly described the work as “a portrait of three generations of powerful women.” “Part of it was trying to stop time,” she said, “which of course I couldn’t do.” _Mommie_ is an unflinching portrait of her family, finding exquisite beauty in the most ordinary moments, comfort through the most painful parts of the aging process and hope in the continuation of life. “I mean life wasn’t easy,” she said, “but they gave so much the best way they knew how.” In some ways its easy to connect all of her photography. In a conversation about the book [_Bacalaitos and Fireworks_](http://www.powerhousebooks.com/site/?p=1222 "undefined"), she said, “It was such a big part of my life and a lot years went into it. You are a witness to certain things that are happy, sad and changes in the environment and those are all my experiences. If I got some memorable photographs and moments, then I feel very fortunate and I think that’s probably why I do it, and why the wandering has a meaning.” [**_Arlene Gottfried_**](http://www.arlenegottfried.com/ "undefined")_is represented by_ [_Daniel Cooney Fine Art_](http://www.danielcooneyfineart.com/ "undefined")_. Her photographs can be found in the collections of the Brooklyn Museum of Art, The New York Public Library, and the Maison Européenne de la Photographie in Paris. Gottfried authored_ [Midnight](http://www.powerhousearena.com/products-page-2/?category=11&product%5Fid=562 "undefined")_,_ [The Eternal Light](http://www.dewilewispublishing.com/PHOTOGRAPHY/Eternal.html "undefined")_,_ [Sometimes Overwhelming](https://www.google.com/search?q=Arlene+Gottfried+TIME+LightBox&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 "undefined"), [Bacalaitos and Fireworks](https://www.google.com/search?q=Arlene+Gottfried+TIME+LightBox&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 "undefined") and [Mommie](http://time.com/4322235/mother-day-three-generations-vintage-photo/ "undefined"). **_Paul Moakley_** _is the Deputy Director of Photography and Visual Enterprise at TIME. Follow him on Twitter_ [_@paulmoakley_](https://time.com/mentions/paulmoakley/ "undefined")_._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4891360/arlene-gottfried-new-york-city-street-photographer-obituary/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4891360/arlene-gottfried-new-york-city-street-photographer-obituary/"},"headline":"Remembering Arlene Gottfried: Legendary New York City Street Photographer","datePublished":"2017-08-08T22:57:41.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:39:28.969Z","description":"A look back at the work of a legendary New York City street photographer","url":"https://time.com/4891360/arlene-gottfried-new-york-city-street-photographer-obituary/","keywords":["LightBox","New York City","photography","Brooklyn","street photography"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb7d53c89dcdb6b66/698892595f570f4354b20d6c/arlene-gottfried-mothers-day.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Paul Moakley","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/paul-moakley/"}],"articleSection":"World","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb7d53c89dcdb6b66/698892595f570f4354b20d6c/arlene-gottfried-mothers-day.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"arlene-gottfried-mothers-day","caption":"Three generations of mothers","creditText":"Arlene Gottfried","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/world/","name":"World"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-lightbox/","name":"LightBox"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4891360/arlene-gottfried-new-york-city-street-photographer-obituary/","name":"Remembering Arlene Gottfried: Legendary New York City Street Photographer"}}]}] ```