You can spray that again! New York drenched in colour – in pictures
Guardian Sta·2026-05-19·via The Guardian
Harry Gruyaert’s vibrant photographs of the Big Apple are bursting with energy – from kids letting off fire hydrants to yellow cabs zooming by in a blur
Water way to have a good time … Manhattan, 1985
Tue 19 May 2026 07.00 BST
Manhattan, 1972
Harry Gruyaert is a Belgian photographer known for his images of India, Morocco and Egypt as well as his innovative use of colour. He is a member of Magnum Photos and his work has been published in a number of books and exhibited widely. For more than 50 years, Gruyaert has wandered New York City’s streets, capturing its dazzling contrasts – from towering skylines and neon-lit diners to multicultural neighbourhoods and fleeting street scenes. Harry Gruyaert: New York is published by Thames and Hudson
Manhattan, liquor store, 1985
Acclaimed French film director, screenwriter and producer Cédric Klapisch has collaborated with Gruyaert, providing text to accompany this striking visual journey. Klapisch’s fictional vignettes blur the lines between reality and imagination. A city of endless spectacle, New York becomes a global stage in Gruyaert’s hands – alive with drama, diversity and colour
Manhattan, 2010
Cédric Klapisch: ‘Harry knows my personal connection with New York, having studied and lived there. It took me some time to figure out what it was about the city that fascinated me so much. There’s a particular kind of light there. The sunlight is sharp and the shadows of the skyscrapers sometimes plunge the streets into a deep penumbra. Tourist guides lead you to believe that it’s a gridlike city, neat and orderly. They claim that it’s divided into three sections: downtown, midtown and uptown. But when you live there, you learn that it’s much more subtle and complex than that’
Manhattan, 1985
‘Living in New York means experiencing chaos and diversity. It’s the very definition of “cosmopolitan”. The word comes from the Greek cosmos, meaning “world” or “universe” and politês, which means “citizen” or “of a city”. When Harry takes pictures on the streets of New York, this is exactly what he’s trying to capture. A cosmopolitan and multicultural population that welcomes strangers without treating them as “other”. Harry creates a portrait of the city that focuses on otherness’
Manhattan, 1985
‘You can’t talk about Harry without mentioning his relationship with colour. His images follow in the footsteps of great colourists like Stephen Shore, Helen Levitt, Ernst Haas, Saul Leiter, Joel Meyerowitz, William Eggleston and Alex Webb: photographers who are very conscious of the key role that colour plays in the structure of an image’
Manhattan, 1985
‘Looking through the images in this selection gives you the same feeling you’d get walking down a New York street. You’re not following a thread of logic but you can feel an effervescence, a commotion, a frenetic fusion of people, signs, street furniture, advertising and cars. The world capital of social contrast and unparalleled ethnic diversity, New York is a combination of rich and poor, communities and skin tones from around the world. The city is a magnificent, many-coloured melee’
Manhattan, 2017
‘While millions of people take millions of photos in the street and the vast majority of these are simply banal, Harry notices the banality but when he captures it with his camera, it turns into something else. When I look at his photos, I immediately see life. I often find myself wondering who these people are that I’m looking at; they turn into characters in a potential movie. And that’s what I’ve enjoyed doing throughout this book’
Madison Avenue, 1985
A vignette by Cédric Klapisch: ‘George told me to check the weather on TV this morning. But I didn’t listen and now I’m stuck in this ridiculous raincoat. It was a gift from my mother-in-law. She’s from South Carolina and she’s always saying “Why did you want to move to New York? Manhattan’s nothing but rain, rain, rain.” I came out of the subway, which was packed, and I’m sweating like nobody’s business under this blue plastic. Yesterday it rained all day but I wasn’t wearing this coat. I wished I had, I was so cold. Apparently it was the wind coming down from Canada’
Queens, 2002
Another vignette: ‘“Did you do it? Is he dead?” “No, not yet. I’m still thinking about it.” “What’s there to think about?” “Look, it’s a tough decision. I know he’s in a bad way, but it’s hard to think I won’t ever see him again. We had some great times together. Walking in this park every morning, it was nice, you know? It’ll be weird not coming here any more.” “But if he’s in pain, you’ve got no choice. Just take him to the vet and they’ll take care of him.” “Yeah, I guess so.”
Manhattan, 2017
‘I know that Harry’s much too modest to consider himself an artist. To me, the purpose of photography – and perhaps a definition of art itself – is to make the banal beautiful. Harry elevates the real by never seeing it as elevated. Reality is reality, it’s the everyday, it’s insignificant, it’s often messy, and sometimes pretty ugly’
Manhattan, 1978
‘By celebrating the man on the street, the “man of no importance”, all the people walking through the city, shopping and running errands, waiting for a bus, a subway train, or a friend, heading for who-knows-where, Harry Gruyaert methodically builds up, step by step and place by place, a multicoloured map of humanity’
Manhattan, 2014
All text by Cédric Klapisch. Harry Gruyaert was born in 1941 in Antwerp, Belgium. He currently lives in Belgium
