--- description: One year ago, more than 800,000 photos were uploaded and tagged as Superstorm Sandy made landfall. On the anniversary of the devastating storm, Fred Ritchin writes for LightBox on the power of the photograph as self-documentary in 2013. title: Hurricane Sandy, One Year Later: Self-Portraits by Communities in Distress image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta7e88c93127b9548/6987a7ed0b72e3399b6e09e5/featuredsandy.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&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 # Superstorm Sandy, One Year Later: Self-Portraits by Communities in Distress by [Fred Ritchin](/author/fred-ritchin/) ## Fred Ritchin Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Oct 24, 2013 8:00 AM CUT  by [Fred Ritchin](/author/fred-ritchin/) ## Fred Ritchin Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Oct 24, 2013 8:00 AM CUT Now that so many millions of people have cellphones with cameras and new photographic technologies are emerging that will allow individuals to constantly record their lives, there is a growing potential for communities to portray themselves, including during periods of disaster. Instagram, for example, allows professionals and amateurs alike to immediately upload images; during Hurricane Sandy last year, ten photos tagged to the storm were uploaded every second; 800,000 pictures were uploaded in all. In contrast, the monumental, multi-year Farm Security Administration program created during the New Deal that focused on American rural poverty with photographers such as Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Russell Lee, Gordon Parks, Arthur Rothstein and Ben Shahn, produced roughly 250,000 images _total_. Whereas cellphone photography by citizens first became a mainstay of news reporting during the bombing of the London Underground in 2005, Instagram emerged as a prominent real-time platform of visual information during last year’s superstorm; _Time_, for example, had [five professional photographers on assignment using their iPhones](http://lightbox.time.com/2012/10/30/in-the-eye-of-the-storm-capturing-sandys-wrath/ "undefined"), and Ben Lowy’s Instagram image made the magazine’s cover. Unlike previous large-scale documentations, Instagram images can be produced and seen in real time, allowing viewers far from the scene to watch as the calamity unfolds. Streams of images from individual photographers and organizations are provided to masses of “followers,” while also allowing interested viewers to skim through groups of photographs according to particular themes. Other major publications also published cellphone pictures by the public (this is now the norm), and one year later a book of Instagram photos, [_#SANDY: Seen Through The iPhones of Acclaimed Photographers_](http://www.mcny.org/exhibition/rising-waters "undefined"), is being planned to raise money for charities, while exhibits such as _Rising Waters: Photographs of Sandy (_recently on view at [New York’s Governors Island](http://www.icp.org/events/2013/august/24/rising-waters-photographs-hurricane-sandy "undefined")) and at the [Museum of the City of New York](http://www.mcny.org/exhibition/rising-waters "undefined") are showing photographs from a variety of sources. This mix of work by professionals and amateurs was previously used, with great success, in _Here is New York: A Democracy of Photographs_, the exhibition that opened immediately after the September 11 attacks in a vacant storefront; inkjet prints were hung on clotheslines, and only after making a $25 charitable contribution for one would the identity of its author—fireman, neighbor, student, professional—be revealed. Besides providing channels to bypass conventional media outlets, Instagram also allows photographers to easily and instantly transform the look of their imagery with a choice of numerous digital filters, many of which reference earlier photographic processes. In seconds the photographer can crop his or her image into a square (required for Instagram), dramatically change the color balance, add a frame, or leave the image as it was. As Instagram’s co-founders put it on their site, “Snap a photo with your mobile phone, then choose a filter to transform the image into a memory to keep around forever.” But memory is not the only goal: “Mobile photos always come out looking mediocre. Our awesome looking filters transform your photos into professional-looking snapshots.” An advantage of Instagram is that it forces the photographer to be close to the action; at this point, there are no powerful zoom lenses available. And even with the considerable filtering, there seems to be less of the targeted retouching and compositing that’s possible with more elaborate software such as Photoshop. There also can be something personal and diaristic about the small, snapshot-like Instagram image, lacking the visual sophistication of larger photographic formats. And as each Instagram image arrives individually on viewers’ mobile phones, it provides a respite, of sorts, from the visual chaos of the Web. (Although the individual nature of the images does not allow comparisons between photos. One of the most interesting would have been to compare the now-famous _New York_ magazine cover image from the sky by Iwan Baan, showing the city’s downtown in darkness because of the electrical outage, with another photographer’s image from a different perspective that shows a Goldman Sachs building still illuminated in the financial district’s obscurity by its own generator. These two would have created an interesting tandem commenting on community and preparedness, or the lack of each.) There are many critics, some of them quite vocal, who detest the nostalgic look of much of the imagery on Instagram, arguing that the service’s filters render it so stylized that the content is obscured. Certainly the ability of an Instagram image to evoke an undeserved nostalgia can be off-putting, especially when dealing with painful contemporary events. Rendering the present as the distant or semi-distant past via an imitation of an old snapshot may diminish what the people in the pictures, and others like them, are at that moment feeling. Rather than evoking “instant” and “telegram” (the two words from which the name Instagram was synthesized), many filtered Instagram images can be reminiscent of a 1960s or ‘70s postcard meandering its way to a destination, a tryst with a fabricated past. Instagram, bought last year by Facebook for one billion dollars, will soon face competition, including from [Google Glass](http://lightbox.time.com/2013/08/19/theater-of-the-streets-shot-on-google-glass/ "undefined") as well as other technologies that allow one to “lifelog,” making a nearly continuous record of everyday experiences. And the soon-to-be-released Narrative is a small, buttonless camera that can be attached to a shirt that will automatically take a photograph every thirty seconds, all day long, and group the vast number of images that are produced according to their metadata, while selecting what it considers the more significant ones. (Several photographic organizations, including the American Society of Media Photographers, are also currently campaigning against Instagram’s terms of use, arguing that they allow Instagram to use and license a photographer’s imagery in perpetuity, while holding the photographer responsible for attorney and other fees in case of any litigation concerning the image.) But not all disasters are the same. Whereas Hurricane Sandy was a catastrophe that those in the Northeastern United States suffered through together, sharing each other’s vulnerability, other circumstances may be more problematic. What might have been the result if those trapped inside the World Trade Towers on September 11 had possessed cellphone cameras? Would it have been enlightening for others on the outside if they were able to distribute images of their terrible predicament, or would large amounts of such first-person imagery have provoked an ugly voyeurism amounting to re-victimization? Would these images have further increased the trauma for a horrified, largely powerless public to even more intolerable levels, and with it the calls for vengeance? These questions can also be asked of the events now taking place in Syria, amply documented in videos and photographs, many by civilians. How does one look at such atrocities, including attacks with chemical weapons on civilians, and carry on with one’s daily activities? How can societies watch but not in some way respond? In the years to come, when people will be wearing Google Glass, able to share videos of atrocities as they are viewed, the perspective of the online spectator should become even more difficult—there may be a longing for the relative selectiveness of Instagram. A new, exponentially larger family album is being created. For it to be accessible, not simply an overload of imagery that causes an even greater distancing from events, more coherent ways to filter it will be necessary. Hopefully we can also find numerous practical applications for this abundance of imagery, such as enabling scientists to better study the impact of storms, helping officials to prepare for future catastrophes, and confronting the larger community, including the International Criminal Court, with unconscionable behavior on the part of specific governments. But the most important question for this “family album” will be to what extent we can enlarge our notion of family. If viewed as happening to the “other,” then much of this imagery—whether joyous or painful—will be ignored by those not directly affected. If, on the other hand, we see ourselves as mutually dependent, both happy for each other’s successes and attentive to each other’s welfare, then even the harshest imagery created by communities of their own distress can serve a purpose. --- [**_Fred Ritchin_**](http://www.tisch.nyu.edu/object/RitchinF.html "undefined") _is a professor at NYU and co-director of the Photography & Human Rights program at the Tisch School of the Arts. His newest book,_[ Bending the Frame: Photojournalism, Documentary, and the Citizen](http://lightbox.time.com/2013/05/29/what-a-photograph-can-accomplish-bending-the-frame-by-fred-ritchin/#1 "undefined")_,_ _was published by Aperture in 2013\._ [Rising Waters: Photographs of Sandy](http://www.mcny.org/exhibition/rising-waters "undefined") _is on view at the Museum of the City of New York from Oct. 29, 2013 – March 2, 2014, presented in conjunction with the International Center of Photography._ [#SANDY: Seen Through The iPhones of Acclaimed Photographers](http://hashtagsandy.com/Pre-Purchase-Book/1/ "undefined") _is available through Daylight from November 2013._ ---  Once Again, Sayville, Long Island, Oct. 30, 2012 Amy Medina (DangRabbit)—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Nor’easter winds and freezing rain on the Staten Island Ferry, Staten Island, N.Y., Nov. 7, 2012 Benjamin Lowy—Reportage by Getty Images for TIME  Hurricane Sandy, Ocean Grove Pier, N.J., Oct. 29, 2012 Bob Bowné—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Alberto Losano stands his ground, Brooklyn, N.Y., Oct. 29, 2012 Benjamin Lowy—Reportage by Getty Images for TIME  Untitled, New York, N.Y., Oct. 29, 2012 Andrew Burton—Getty Images/Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Dumbo inundated with flood water, Brooklyn, N.Y., Oct. 29, 2012 Benjamin Lowy—Reportage by Getty Images for TIME  Blackout on the Brooklyn Bridge, N.Y., Nov. 2, 2012 Matt Nighswander—NBC News/Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  East River and Brooklyn Bridge Park, Brooklyn, N.Y., 2012 Alex Fradkin—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Hoboken – Morning after Hurricane Sandy N.J., Oct. 30, 2012 Andrew Bacha—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Ash St. & McGuinness Blvd. flooded by the Newtown Creek, Greenpoint, Brooklyn, N.Y., Oct. 29, 2012 Andrew Frasz—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  South Ferry Station, New York, N.Y., Nov. 2, 2012 Gina LeVay—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Pumping water from Jersey City PATH tunnels after Hurricane Sandy, N.J., Nov. 4, 2012 Esther Horvath—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Coney Island Subway Yard, Brooklyn, N.Y., Oct. 29, 2012 Lenny Pridatko—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  A truck submerged in water at the entrance to the Brooklyn-Battery tunnel in Lower Manhattan, N.Y., 2012 Michael Christopher Brown for TIME  Broad Channel Underwater, Queens, N.Y., Oct. 29th, 2012 Mike Stewart—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Home, Queens, N.Y., Oct. 29, 2012 Sam Wood—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Fire and Water in Breezy Point, Queens, N.Y., Oct. 30, 2012 Natalie Keyssar—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  The destruction in Breezy Point following the fire and storm surge, Queens, N.Y., Oct. 30, 2012 Benjamin Lowy—Reportage by Getty Images for TIME  The Morning After, Breezy Point, Queens, N.Y., Oct. 30, 2012 Philip Montgomery—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  New Yorkers charge their mobile phones with generators provided by Percy's Tavern, located on Avenue A and 13th Street, New York, N.Y., 2012 Michael Christopher Brown for TIME  Recharging at the Post Office, New York, N.Y., Oct. 30, 2012 Samira Bouaou—Epoch Times/Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Donations Queens, N.Y., 2012 Natan Dvir—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  National Guardsmen go door-to-door in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, Queens, N.Y., Nov. 11, 2012 Steven Greaves—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Untitled, Toms River N.J., Nov. 5, 2012 Andrew Burton—Getty Images/Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Untitled, Brooklyn, N.Y., Nov. 3, 2012 Allison Joyce—Getty Images/Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Residents and volunteers warm themselves near a fire on Cedar Grove Avenue, Staten Island, N.Y., 2012 Eugene Richards for TIME  Camp Rubicon muck out Sundries Shoppe, Rockaway, Queens, N.Y., 2012 C. Bay Milin—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Torn Flag, Union Beach, N.J., 2012 Ruddy Roye—Courtesy of Daylight  Digging the Sand Out, Long Beach, N.Y., Nov. 4, 2012 Marcus Yam—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Home Cleanup, Union Beach, N.J., Nov. 6, 2012 Ken Cedeno—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Strong winds and waves ripped several homes from their foundation, like this one in the Oakwood neighborhood, Staten Island, N.Y., 2012 Stephen Wilkes for TIME  Sofia at YANA Community Center, Rockaway Park Queens, N.Y., Dec. 5, 2012 Tracie Williams—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  New Dorp Beach, Staten Island, Nov. 6, 2012 Erica Lansner—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Salvaging photographs in New Dorp, Staten Island, N.Y., Nov. 11, 2012 Ed Kashi—VII/Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Amish women from Greenville, P.A., clear out a house on 2nd Street in Union Beach, N.J., Nov. 19, 2012 Aristide Economopoulos—The Star-Ledger/Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Outdoor Bathroom, Seaside Heights, N.J., Jan. 9, 2013 Joshua B. Raab—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Belle Harbor Queens, N.Y., Nov. 2, 2012 Jonathan Lucas Auch—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Marie Pointing, Searise II, Coney Island Brooklyn, N.Y., Oct. 31, 2012 Timothy Briner—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Untitled, Queens, N.Y., Dec. 6, 2012 Jessie Adler—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Subway Map, Crom Crossfit, Rockaway, Queens, N.Y., November 2013 Wyatt Gallery—Courtesy of Daylight  On the night Sandy made landfall, a fire swept through this community on the tip of the Rockaway Peninsula, consuming more than 100 homes, Breezy Point, N.Y., 2012 Stephen Wilkes for TIME  Displaced Home, Kissam Avenue, Oakwood Beach, Staten Island, N.Y., 2012 Wyatt Gallery—Courtesy of Daylight  Kitchen, Belle Harbor Queens, N.Y., December 2012 Ellen J. Wolff—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  The parking lot of Jacob Riis Park has become a temporary dump for approximately 250,000 tons of debris collected by New York City's sanitation department so far, Queens, N.Y., 2012 Stephen Wilkes for TIME  Window Curtains and Flood Line, New Dorp, Staten Island, N.Y., 2012 Wyatt Gallery—Courtesy of Daylight  Global Warming Is Here, Queens, N.Y., 2012 Natan Dvir—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Swings and Puddle, Breezy Point, Queens, N.Y., October 2012 Wyatt Gallery—Courtesy of Daylight  Hurricane Sandy Aftermath: Lower Manhattan, New York, N.Y., Oct. 30, 2012 Bryan Smith—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Sunset and Boat, Oakwood Beach, Staten Island, N.Y., 2012 Wyatt Gallery—Courtesy of Daylight  Debris stored next to a basketball hoop in Breezy Point, Queens, N.Y., Nov. 10, 2012 Svetlana Bachevanova—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Paradise Park, Highlands, N.J., Nov. 3, 2012 Bryan Thomas—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  Notice of lost cats, updated when they were found, New Dorp Avenue, Staten Island, N.Y., 2012 Catherine Nance—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  The Star Jet roller coaster at Casino Pier amusement park, once a Jersey Shore landmark, remains partly submerged in the Atlantic, Seaside Heights, N.J., 2012 Stephen Wilkes for TIME  Seaside Funtown Dino, Seaside Heights, N.J., Jan. 7, 2013 Rob Lybeck—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York  A beach front home lies in tatters, Union Beach, N.J., Nov. 9, 2012 Benjamin Lowy—Reportage by Getty Image for TIME  Untitled, Breezy Point Queens, N.Y., Nov. 10, 2012 Deirdre Galvin—Courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3803460/superstorm-sandy-one-year-later-self-portraits-by-communities-in-distress/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3803460/superstorm-sandy-one-year-later-self-portraits-by-communities-in-distress/"},"headline":"Superstorm Sandy, One Year Later: Self-Portraits by Communities in Distress","datePublished":"2013-10-24T08:00:53.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:40:38.347Z","description":"One year ago, more than 800,000 photos were uploaded and tagged as Superstorm Sandy made landfall. 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