MICHAEL JOSEPH | Nika, 2023

My earliest memories of Provincetown are centered around renting a house for a week with friends. It was a bonding time that contributed to forming an authentic queer identity away from the confines of heteronormative society. My biggest impression was made by the people. I learned about queer culture and history from those I met and my surroundings. Returning over the years, I was inspired to document the vast diversity and multifaceted subculture within the LGBTQ+ community in this space. The “Wild West of the East” is a street portrait series celebrating the people of Provincetown, MA. These Big Shot Polaroid portraits are made mostly in public. Provincetown is transformative space. It’s a small seaside town with a big history. The tradition of acceptance lies deep. It is a found Neverland where the concept of “play” is encouraged. The conscious self is taken away with the tide. This sense of freedom is palpable. It is creative, sexual, and exploratory. Normal Mailer famously called Provincetown the “Wild West of the East” and described Provincetown as “the last democratic town in America where everyone was absolutely equal.” Famous for its people-watching, Commercial Street serves as a thoroughfare where drag queens bark, parades crawl, leather men strut, and creatively dressed (or barely dressed at all) are in transit. Historically, among those might be writers, Tennessee Williams, Eugene O’Neill, and artists such Mark Rothko and Franz Kline. Provincetown is criticized as having lost is Bohemian feel or seedy charm. A night out on the town reveals that this is not lost, and it is the people who make Provincetown what it is, not the place itself. A newcomer states “it is a site of connecting to a greater queer history – learning about the wonderful traditions and rituals a community built before me. It’s about a place of exploration of identity, making memories with good friends, and contributing to a place that has allowed me to be more fully alive.”

BIO

Michael Joseph is a street portrait and documentary photographer.  Raised just outside of New York City, his inspirations are drawn from interactions with strangers on city streets and aims to afford his audience the same experience through his photographs.  His portraits are made on the street, often unplanned and up close to allow the viewer to explore the immediate and unseen. Themes throughout his portraiture and projects include identity formation, found family, wanderlust, the human journey, the search for equality and human authenticity. His first monograph, "Lost and Found: A Portrait of American Wanderlust" will be published in Fall, 2023 (Europe) and Spring, 2024 (USA) by Kehrer Verlag. Michael’s work has been featured on CNN, Vice, The Guardian, Dazed, AnotherMan, Paper Magazine, HUCK, the Advocate, and published in magazines internationally including Elle, Inked, 1814 and SHOTS. He has been exhibited nationally, with solo shows at Daniel Cooney Fine Art (New York, NY) and the Soho Photo Gallery (New York, NY) and the FP3 Gallery (Boston, MA). Group exhibitions include the notable Aperture Gallery (New York, NY), the Getty Images Gallery (London, UK) and the Griffin Museum of Photography (Massachusetts). He has lectured at the International Center of Photography (New York, NY), the Savannah College of Art and Design (Savannah, GA), in portraiture classes at the New England School of Photography (Boston, MA) and taught at the Light Factory (Charlotte, NC). His portraits are held in the permanent collection at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (Houston, TX) Fort Wayne Museum of Art (Fort Wayne, Indiana), the Rochester Museum of Fine Arts (Rochester, NH), the Jack Sheer Collection, Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery (Saratoga Springs, NY)and private collections. He is a 2023 and 2016 Photolucida Top 50 Photographer, 2020 Photolucida Finalist, and LensCulture Portrait Award Finalist. He is a recipient of the fellowship in photography from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a residency at Twenty Summers (Provincetown, Ma) and a grant from the Peter S. Reed Foundation.