Quest For Dirtman – Street Portraits

The Dirtman Story – Amazing Street Photography

The true story of my quest for dirtman, and the street portraits I took along the way. You may ask yourself, who in the hell is Dirtman, and what kind of quest could this be. To be honest, it’s a story about myself, a young man in my early 30s, infatuated with photography, and wanting to learn how to take images that tell a story. Being from the south side of Chicago, with a less than adequate public education, I had no idea what an art gallery was. As far as an art education, I was so green I could have been a Leprechaun. Street smarts were another story, so thank god for at least that.The Quest For Dirtman story starts in 1998, when I moved from the south suburbs to the south loop of Chicago.

My First Camera of the Series – Bronica S2

: Simion

: Laundry Time

: Street Walker

: Street Recluse

Coming to Chicago with my 1961 medium format Bronica beast of a camera, I decided to settle in on a Michigan avenue address, across from Grant Park. This camera was another reason I became totally enamored with photography. No plastic here, that’s for sure. The louder the shutter, the more I liked it.

My intentions were to make photographs that told a story. The ones that I use to look at in books and magazines. Being a complete moron in high school, who never did his homework. Never paying much attention the the authors of the books I opened, just looking at the images. If it weren’t for my work ethic and family, I’m sure this would be a different story.

Six Months Photographing Street Portrait Duds

The first 6 months on my quest to become a famous photographer was a complete bust. I never saved one of those negatives, in fact, I was so discouraged that I just about gave up street photography completely. Film wasn’t cheap, so this had to end, or I needed to give it up. I rented every camera at Calumet on Halstead street, thinking that maybe if I used a better camera, things would look better. Not the case.

Having the worst images known to man, I decided to start reading photography books to manipulate lighting, shadow and depth of field through the camera. This helped immensely with architecture, but not with street images. Finally I figured out that with most photography in general, you don’t need a connection with your subject at all, in order to make amazing pictures. Street photography was not the case. You need to make a connection to portray your story. Without that, I found, my images looked flat and boring.

Street Photographers Not Taken Seriously

The word (street photography) in those days was a bad word it seemed. Most people I knew said street photographers were snapshot warriors. Photogs that just shoot away without any sort of composition or thought. I found out those first six months, that its probably one of the hardest genres of photography to learn, with having a huge emphasis on composition and detail. Having some balls seemed to help as well.

Street Photography - Quest For Dirtman

The light finally came one one evening, when I met a man sitting on a park bench in Grant Park. I sat down next to him and started a conversation. After a while, I asked him if I could get a few photos of him while we talked. The questions I asked him brought out different emotions. Those were my first real images that told a story all on their own. Over the years, this whole process has been tweaked. Not only did my pictures finally get the approval by myself, but they did to others as well.

My next step was to join a photography club, and see what my peers thought of my work. So I stopped into one of Chicago’s oldest and most talked about club in the south loop of Chicago (Printers Row). The person in charge let me sit in to watch one of the club’s print competitions. That made me nervous as hell. Two older club members that had images being voted on, were arguing with one another. They were actually screaming. I thought for sure they were going to fight. The older white man calling the asian man (KungFu) and the other calling the white man asshole. I got up and left after a 5 minutes of that, and decided to join a club in the burbs of Palos Heights.

Chicago Photo Competitions

Being the youngest by at least 20 years, I was again apprehensive, but that changed the first club meeting. Everyone was extremely professional and helpful. We had a print competition each month, and the winning prints would be sent to the monthly Chicago area competition, where all the clubs sent their winning prints. Well, I won all of my club competitions, and placed 1st through 3rd in all the Chicago area competitions as well. At my local club, the meeting before the print contest, everyone was asked if they wanted to enter a print into the competition. Some of my fellow mombers said they would net enter anything if I was entering. That was my last day in the club. I never even came back to get the ribbons I had one. They may still be there today. I just decided, it was time to move on.

Street Photography at Night

At the beginning, most of my work from this series was done after dark. This seemed to be the best time to find the most interesting subjects. After a few nights of being threatened, I decided to find someone to take with, and watch my back. Better yet, someone that knew the lifestyle and the people that came out at night. Even better yet, A big man that could act as a security guard, just in case. Big John, a homeless man living on lower Wacker drive was the perfect choice.

Big John’s price was a fifth of Cognac, and $100 cash per week, in advance. This worked out very well for a month, until most of the street folks got to know me, and I became more street smart around the city streets. John told me of a guy called Dirtman. He said this man is probably the most unique person to meet, if we can find him. This man is actually not dirty at all, but in fact keeps himself military clean. This is the nickname they gave him. Dirtman is supposedly a very dangerous ex-military person that lives hidden amongst the recluse here. Now that was a person I needed to find. In fact he was all I could think about now. Each night we went out on the usual adventure, meeting and talking with interesting street people. Although this was great, all I could think about was finding Dirtman.

Dangerous Streets – Close Call

One night on lower Wacker, I was talking to a homeless man, when another ran up behind me, thrusting a large knife towards my back. *Thank you Big John* He caught the guys arm just before it went into my back. Then he threw the man to the ground and almost beat him to death. It took all my strength to pull John off the guy.

That was the last night John and I saw each other. From that point on, I decided to photograph mostly in the daytime, or areas at night that weren’t as dangerous.

About a week after John disappeared back into the dark remote streets of the Chicago underworld, I decided to head back down to the hidden corners of Lower Wacker, in search of Dirtman. Middle of the day mind you, but still dark where I was looking. Finally about to give up and head back up top to civilization, I heard some sounds coming from a very dark area of the underground. It was so dark that I did not know there was a partial wall blocking all visible light. Since cell phones were primitive and outrageously expensive at the time, I did not own one to light the way. As I passed that brick facade, a light was shining onto a concrete column, with a large mirror attached to it. In front of the mirror, brushing his hair was the one and only Dirtman.

As I started walking gingerly towards him, I spoke out loud to let him know I was coming towards him. When I got within about ten feet from dirtman, he turned to face me. He had very long hair with an equally long blond beard. A soft but stern voice said “turn around and leave here. I don’t want to talk and especially don’t even think about taking a picture. If you do not leave here now, I will kill you”. Looking into his eyes, I knew he was serious, so I turned around without another word, and walked away. I remember months later seeing him walking over a bridge on lower wacker. I will have to look and see if I can find that negative and get it scanned.

Street Photography – Present Day

After my intense meeting with dirtman, I decided to add regular urban street scenes and architecture to this series. Since it’s all taken from city streets, they should be included. I have also decided to re-join Instagram again. I left with many thousands of followers, but it just did not seem genuine. This time, I decided to take it slow and make it completely organic. The only other social media I have is Linkedin.