Oh, the Bouts He Has Seen

Matt Weber

 Hunting a moment” is how Matt Weber, 55, describes his approach to photographing New York City street scenes for the past three decades, and many of those moments have been distinguished by the flying fists, stinging obscenities and cheering crowds of the New York City street fight.It is a subject that, whether for real or play, makes for a powerful photograph because it has “motion and emotion,” Mr. Weber said.Mr. Weber began driving a yellow cab in 1978 at age 20, and what he saw through the windshield of his wheezing Dodge Aspen taxi, including a knife fight near the Port Authority, convinced him to buy a $150 Canon. It was a purchase that “saved me from a boring life,” said Mr. Weber, who would often shoot right from the driver’s seat, develop the film at home and then hang prints in the hallway of his building on West 86th Street. Mr. Weber is the subject of a new documentary, “More Than the Rainbow,” directed by Dan Wechsler, which was to be screened Friday night at the Coney Island Film Festival. Driving a cab, Mr. Weber said, he “went from being a taxi driver with a camera, to a photographer with a taxi.” And fight pictures became just one genre of his wide variety of candid city shots. He became dedicated to catching elusive moments that could not be staged or even predicted. All you can do is, like a fisherman, put your time in — skills honed and equipment ready, he said. He also enjoys shooting couples kissing. “It’s the two ends of the spectrum, love and anger,” he said. “Both show people when they’re peaking.”

 by : Corey Kilgannon