Chinatown NYC – work in progress at Katja Heinemann

Chinatown NYC – work in progress

For the past year, I have photographed in NYC’s Chinatown, thus far focusing on the Manhattan and Flushing neighborhoods. This photo essay was initially commissioned by German magazine Der Spiegel, and when I began shooting I was hoping to juxtapose scenes from New York’s newer – mostly Fujianese – immigrant community with images portraying the quickly disappearing past of Manhattan’s original Chinatown, which remains present in certain cultural institutions and individual elders.

I was looking for a wide array of milestones such as weddings and funerals, baptisms and graduations. I looked at local politics and participation in civic engagement, from current elected officials to NYC comptroller John Liu running for Mayor of New York City, and the vibrant community institutions that came together in a moment of crisis when hurricane Sandy caused a complete black-out in the neighborhood, which lasted for several days.

Little Fuzhou abuts Manhattan's traditional Cantonese Chinatown at the intersection of the Bowery & Doyers Street.

The images below are from this first, exploratory period. One of my key interests lay in finding moments and scenes where people exhibit their aspirational identities – the dreams and religious beliefs people rely on and forge for themselves among the relentless work and daily hustle of urban life that is New York City.

The city’s Chinese community is the largest in the Western Hemisphere, and while it was originally established more than 150 years ago, it wasn’t until the mid-sixties, after the relaxing of immigration restrictions and quotas that kept Asian and specifically Chinese immigration to the US low, that New York’s Chinatown experienced its renaissance period. Since then, the neighborhood has undergone continuing changes.

The political opening of the civil rights era was followed by the turmoil of the gang years, and the loss of the textile manufacturing base and small businesses post 9-11. Gentrification and lack of affordable housing is a reality, and census figures show an increase of more than 40% of white influx into Manhattan’s traditional Chinatown between 2000 and 2010. And yet, there is continuing migration to the area, while many more New Yorkers of Chinese descent are settling in the newer ethnic enclaves of Flushing, Queens, and Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

The themes and the images below are initial drafts and sketches, containing preliminary ideas as well as the first successful images that form the foundation of a growing body of work. In the end, while themes are important, this will be about creating interesting images that can adequately portray a neighborhood and community in flux.

Increasingly, I am finding my attention drawn to the spirit of youth, and to the way each generation reframes and rediscovers what it means to be American. Going forward, I will concentrate on portraits, moments and story lines that depict the 1.5 generation of young people who were brought to the country by their parents at a young age, and some of their second-generation peers who are American-born, but were raised in families of recent immigrants.

These are the newest Americans. As a group, Asian Americans constitute the nation’s fastest growing immigrant demographic, and three in four Asian-American adults were born abroad. At the same time, today’s youths live in an era of dissolving national identities, in a post-geographic, virtual culture of facebook and communication technologies that make a relocation to a different continent less of an incisive, permanently life altering event than was the case during their parents’ generation.

Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association fashion gala.

Friday night on Doyers Street. Encroaching gentrification has brought several trendy new bars to the area.

Year of the Snake – last minute shopping for lunar new year's decorations on Mott Street.

Easter Baptism and Holy Vigil at Church of the Transfiguration.

Teenage AKF Dance Group performers.

AKF Dance Group from Flushing, Queens.

Ken the stylist backstage at a fashion show.

Handball court, Flushing, Queens.

Annual Procession of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, Church of the Transfiguration.

Jack Hsu of the progressive rock band Hsu-nami performs at Echo Music Fest.

Wedding dress rehearsal, Miss Angel Model Contest.

Pell Street model shoot for a Spanish fashion magazine.

Lion Dance on Mott Street in honor of the year of the snake.

Chinatown Community Young Lions founder Brian Tom.

Lion Dance in honor of the lunar new year, ringing in the year of the snake.

Double Ten celebration and wreath laying at Sun Yat-sen statue in Columbus Park.

Funeral directors on Mulberry Street.

Playing chess in Columbus Park.

LaGuardia High School for the Arts prom outing.

Thanksgiving is a traditional day for couples from around the country to get married in New York's Chinatown.

Outside an East Broadway beauty parlor, Thanksgiving Day.

East Broadway wedding, Thanksgiving Day.

Emma Lazarus High School graduates its first full senior class of recent immigrant English Language Learners.

Procession of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, Church of the Transfiguration.

Campaigning for Grace Meng for Congress during NYC's primary elections, Flushing, Queens.

Democratic Congressional Candidate Grace Meng answers questions after a Flushing town hall meeting during the NY primaries.

Veteran's Day Parade. Francis Lewis High School in Queens has the largest JROTC program in the nation.

Vigil against hazing and racism in the armed forces, commemorating Private Danny Chen on the first anniversary of his death.

Democratic City Comptroller John C. Liu announces his mayoral campaign.

• Chinatown as Island covered the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy and the ensuing blackout – the loss of power as well as the lack of communication and information in a linguistically isolated community.