ABOUT THE PROJECT

LOGLINE
UNCROPPED rediscovers the work of New York photographer James Hamilton, one of the great chroniclers of the cultural history of America over the last half century.

SYNOPSIS
For over four decades working as a staff photographer, James Hamilton was a fixture of print journalism in New York City. From his freewheeling start in 1968 at the hugely influential music magazine Crawdaddy, through his phenomenal twenty years at The Village Voice to his unique position at The New York Observer, Hamilton captured some of the most remarkable people and events of the last half century.

A New York legend himself, Hamilton shot music photography on assignment with a freelancing Patti Smith, took intimate portraits of everyone from Liza Minnelli to Lou Reed, broke off to do set photography for George Romero, Noah Baumbach and Wes Anderson, and pursued powerful and controversial stories across the U.S. and the world. All the while he never stopped amassing a stunning chronicle of his beloved New York City in all its grit and glory. Hamilton’s story and vast archive of rarely or never seen images offer a singular window into a bygone era of alternative print journalism. In particular, the film examines the importance of The Village Voice through the lens of his photography and the creative relationships he forged there.

Widely published yet insistently personal, James Hamilton’s unforgettable body of work represents an enormously valuable archive of American cultural and political history.

PROJECT TYPE Documentary Feature

DIRECTOR D.W. Young
PRODUCER Judith Mizrachy