After covering the first hip hop showcase in the UK for Melody Makermagazine in 1982, British photographer Janette Beckman became hooked to the newly emerging style and sound of New York street culture. That Christmas, she decided to see the scene for herself.
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“I took the train from JFK airport and got off at West Fourth Street,” Beckman recalls of her first foray into the heart of downtown New York. “It was very exciting. Kids were carrying boomboxes on the train and people were breakdancing on the street. It was like everything I saw in the movies. I was a big Scorsese fan and here I was walking on those Mean Streets.”
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Once she arrived, Beckman decided to call the city her home, settling down in the East Village and opening a photo studio on Lafayette Street. In 1984, Beckman got word that her good friend Kim Hastreiter and David Hershkovits were launching Paper, a black-and-white fold-out zine. “They asked if I wanted to take photos, and I did.”
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