A Post-Industrial Paradox

Go Forth Where, 2009, silver gelatin print

LaToya Ruby Frazier’s specially commissioned project for frieze juxtaposes photographs taken in her home town of Braddock, Pennsylvania — an economically struggling suburb of Pittsburgh — with images from a major advertising campaign for Levi’s, which made use of Braddock’s present gentrification developments. Combining Frazier’s family history with documentary photography, A Post-Industrial Paradox demonstrates how the stark reality of urban decline is exploited and romanticized for big business.