Blood on the Pavement

Nathanael Turner’s Bloody Brooklyn arrived around the time everyone was still figuring out what Brooklyn actually meant—whether it was still a place or had become a brand, whether the grit was real or art-directed. Turner didn’t seem interested in that argument. His photographs are less about Brooklyn-as-idea and more about specific walls, specific faces, specific corners where the light does something interesting to a fire escape. The title is a provocation, but the work underneath it is patient. You end up spending more time in each frame than you expected to.