Leica & Magnum: Photographs from the Streets of Chicago by Alex Webb

This photo essay, part of our collaboration with Magnum Photos, documents Alex Webb's exploration of Chicago and the Loop. Inspired in part by one of his early influences, Ray Metzker's "My Camera and I in the Loop," he explores the streets of the US's "Second City." Though unlike the street photographers of the so-called Chicago School (Callahan, Metzger, Sturr, Sterling), Alex Webb has chosen to photograph the city's multitudinous character in color. Having spent most of his 30 year long career shooting outside of the US, Alex Webb turns his lens to his home nation during this very important election year.

[boarini]

This is inspiring to all photographers because it shows that a legend like Alex Webb works his ass off to be where he is.

[DannyBach]

I thought the same when I first looked at Alex Webb's work, but now he's one of the best genuine street photographers that I always look up. His work is not meant to be easy to look at :)

[justice.wilson]

Wow some of the best lighting images I've seen. Still got my smile on. Inspiration in 4.5 min.

[Aviba]

People are clueless, this is wonderful street photography.

[pizza]

I can't believe they decided to share all these photos. Because for the first time ever, I saw mediocre pictures taken by Alex Webb. There were several phenomenal ones in his trademark style, and they really should have only shown those.

On the other hand, it's kind of cool to know that Alex Webb is human after all.

[carlopangan]

Attention to details, sophisticated images.:)

[macallanvintage]

The device is irrelevant.

Some of the pics above are not easy to capture, as its a spur of the moment, involving various people all spread out within the frame.

An enthusiast with a great eye, and a flagship smartphone, can easily capture those shots, which do not need a Leica or Fujifilm or analogue camera, or the cleverly over-hyped X100V and GR3.

[DonDon-Corleone]

Alex once said, that 99.9% of your photography is fail. That's why for so many years, he could only have those few selected great photographs. And, that's because of his hard hard hard working everyday.

[peteragoston]

Yes, few of the pictures are mediocre (considering who took them), but I think that's the point. I personally found it very refreshing to see that even Alex Webb has to work hard to get great pictures. His greatest hits are so phenomenal that they seem absolutely unreachable for a beginner street photographer like me, these pictures however show how he gets there.
Also interesting that his unique style comes through even in those "forgettable" photos.

[nocommentnoname]

surprising these pix came from a Magnum photog. quite ordinary, really.

[arunashamal]

Man! digital sure looks like crap compared to kodachrome!

[patio]

That's not the sound a vuvuzela makes.

[pimpvandestraat]

TomZentra. your initial comment is inexcusable. I hope your just trolling.

[adambu]

Like some already said before, the pictures shown are average snap shots at best and even clearly show to me as an amateur photographer that they were taken from somebody free of any technical skills, following the agenda: Set F8-11, 3meters and put it into AUTO. This creates front to back sharp pictures and totally negates all the awsom qualities that Leica lenses are famose for (performance wide open i.e.). The subject matter becomes hard to recogize and creates cheap cell phone like pictures. But wait, Leica found the possibility to use shallow depth of field so important that they even pinoeered to introduced a technology to smart phones that allows adjusting depth of field. It is very remarkable as a camera manufacurer to post videos like that. It sends out three messages:
-nowadays you don't need to know how to opperate a camera to be a success photographer
-equipment does not matter
-selfpromotion is more important than quality
To be clear, this is about the pictures shown in this video ONLY!

[nocommentnoname]

this is the work of a Magnum photog?? my niece can take better snaps than that.

[shumyinghon]

having watched several of such arty street photography works videos, seem to me that you only need a very expensive camera to endorse mediocre work. very clever mkting indeed