Bruce Davidson’s First Magnum Photo-Essay

Bruce Davidson’s photo essay: Brooklyn Gang (1959)

In 1959, Bruce Davidson embedded himself with a group of Brooklyn teenagers known as the Jokers, producing his landmark series Brooklyn Gang. The series was Davidson’s first major project after joining the renowned Magnum agency.

Inspired by the restless energy of films like Rebel Without a Cause (1955) and the musical West Side Story (1956), and by the wider postwar counterculture, Davidson set out to explore the realities behind the headlines. After reading a newspaper report about gang violence in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, he sought out one of the groups involved.

The result was an intimate portrait of the Jokers, an Irish- and Polish-American gang whose turf was a block in the working-class neighborhood of Park Slope. Davidson himself was of Polish origin.

Brooklyn Gang (1959)

Most were Catholic school kids or dropouts, drifting between boredom and bravado. They smoked, loitered, courted, and clashed with rivals in rumbles that could escalate from bricks and bats to knives and even crude homemade “zip guns.”

Yet Davidson chose not to sensationalize their crimes; instead, he revealed the quieter rhythms of their daily lives, capturing a rare glimpse of adolescence on the edge.

Bruce Davidson Brooklyn — *Youth with Bandaged Hand Brooklyn Gang 1959*
Gelatin silver print printed c 1959
8 12 x 12 12 inches 216 x 318 cm image
11 x 14 inches sheet
Signed in pencil titled The Gang in ink DavidsonMagnum Photos copyright credit stamp and affixed caption label verso
Estimate $2000 $3000

Youth with Bandaged Hand, Brooklyn Gang, 1959 is currently available at Heritage Auctions, 21 October 2025, sold without reserve to benefit the Joshua Tree Highlands Artist Residency.

Far from the romanticized greasers of Hollywood, these kids were bruised, restless, and already jaded by the hard edges of urban life.

“I was 26 and they were 15, but I could see my own repression in them and I began to feel a connection to their desperation. I began to feel their isolation and even my own,” Davidson said.

Over 11 months, Davidson photographed the Jokers smoking on stoops, hanging out in candy stores, lounging on Coney Island beaches, and drifting through a city that offered little escape.

What made the work powerful was his empathy — Davidson wasn’t just documenting delinquency, he was revealing vulnerability, capturing fleeting moments of tenderness and boredom within the bravado — it opened the door for an entire way of seeing youth culture and their coming of age.

Brooklyn Gang became one of the first intimate photo essays on disaffected youth in America, setting the tone for later explorations of subcultures and cementing Davidson’s reputation as a photographer unafraid to get close enough to feel the sweat and the cigarette smoke.

His willingness to immerse himself in the Jokers’ world, to portray their toughness alongside their vulnerability, became a template for later photographers who sought intimacy with their subjects rather than distance.

Bruce Davidson's Youths Smoking, Brooklyn Gang, 1959 — *Youths Smoking Brooklyn Gang 1959*
Gelatin silver print printed c 1959
9 x 13 38 inches 229 x 339 cm imagesheet
Signed titled The Gang in pencil and with various DavidsonMagnum Photos copyright credit reproduction limitation stamps and affixed labels verso
Estimate $2000 $3000

Youths Smoking is currently at Heritage Auctions, 21 October 2025, sold without Reserve to Benefit the Joshua Tree Highlands Artist Residency.

The photobook Brooklyn Gang: Summer 1959 by Bruce Davidson, Hardcover:

This 1998 edition of Bruce Davidson’s landmark study of New York street kids in the 1950s is a collector’s item.

With much of his work still hard to find in print apart from Central Park, this volume is essential for photography lovers and anyone intrigued by New York’s gritty, colorful past.

Nan Goldin’s The Ballad of Sexual Dependency and Larry Clark’s Tulsa both echo Davidson’s approach: embedding within a scene, photographing friends and lovers in their rawest moments, and trusting that honesty would outweigh judgment.

The DNA of Brooklyn Gang runs through these later works — a belief that to truly capture youth, you have to live it, or at least stand close enough to the smoke-filled rooms and broken boardwalks to feel what it means to come of age on the margins.

Within Magnum’s tradition of humanist, long-form projects, Brooklyn Gang stands out as an early example of immersive storytelling that went far beyond spot news or single-frame icons.

Untitled, Brooklyn Gang, 1959
Gelatin silver print, printed later
9-3/8 x 6 inches (23.7 x 15.2 cm) (image)
14 x 11 inches (sheet)
Signed and negative notation 59-7-203/38 in pencil, verso.
Estimate: $1,500 – $2,000.

Benjie Crossing Himself in Front of Holy Name Church, Brooklyn Gang, 1959
Gelatin silver print, printed later
10-1/2 x 8-7/8 inches (26.7 x 2.2 cm) (image)
14 x 11 inches (sheet)
Signed and negative notation 59-7-239/13 in pencil, verso.
Estimate: $1,500 – $2,000.

Davidson’s approach — spending months with the Jokers, returning again and again until the camera became part of their furniture — echoed the ethos of his Magnum contemporaries, who believed photography could illuminate the texture of ordinary lives with dignity and depth.

Just as Cartier-Bresson sought the “decisive moment” and Eugene Smith immersed himself in long, obsessive essays, Davidson demonstrated that even the so-called juvenile delinquents of post-war New York deserved the same attention as presidents, war zones, or rural farmers.

“W. Eugene Smith’s photo essays taught me that a photograph could not only communicate emotions, but could also serve the human condition,” said Bruce Davidson.

By situating Brooklyn Gang within Magnum’s lineage, the work underscores how documentary photography, at its best, collapses the distance between subject and viewer, demanding not just observation but empathy.

Cover of Bob Dylan’s Together Through Life album and book

One of Bruce Davidson’s Brooklyn Gang photographs — a striking image of a young couple in a tense embrace — was used on the cover of Bob Dylan’s 2009 album Together Through Life and its accompanying book.

The choice underscored how Davidson’s raw portraits of 1950s street life resonated with Dylan’s own explorations of love, struggle, and restless youth. Dylan moved to New York in 1961 to pursue his music career.

Bruce Davidson Brooklyn Bob Dylan cover — Click the image to buy Bob Dylans Together Through Life from our affiliate Amazon

Dylan has long drawn on Magnum’s archives for his projects, selecting images that mirror the grit and lyricism of his songs, and in doing so has forged a lasting connection between music and documentary photography.

How much are Bruce Davidson’s prints of Brooklyn Gang worth?

Bruce Davidson’s “Brooklyn Gang” prints can be worth thousands of dollars, with specific examples fetching prices between $2,000 and $15,000 or more, depending on the image, printing, and auction house, but some individual prints from the series are listed for approximately $4,500 to $15,000 on the Magnum Photos Store.

For example, a print of a couple kissing in a car sold for over $3,500 at auction, while a more general “Contact Sheet Print” from the series was listed at a lower price range.

Brooklyn Gang, Coney Island, New York, 1959. A 6 1/2 x 10 in. (16.5 x 25.4 cm) print, printed in the 1960s, sold for $8,000 USD on an estimate of $7,000 USD – $9,000 USD at Phillips auctions, New York, in 2019.

This particular image is valuable because of its age and it has been published widely. Cathy, a member of the Jokers gang known as the Bridget Bardot of the Brooklyn streets, adjusts her hair in the mirrored cigarette machine while beside her, Artie Jean Marino rolls a cigarette pack into the sleeve of his tee shirt. Artie Marino would later work as a New York City detective.

Factors Influencing Value

The specific image: Individual photos from the “Brooklyn Gang” series vary in value.
Print quality: Prints are worth more if they are original and in good condition.
Signature and markings: Signed prints or those with the photographer’s copyright stamp are more valuable.
Auction house: The reputation of the auction house can affect the final price, such as Phillips, Christie’s, and Swann Auction Galleries.
Exhibition history: Provenance, such as inclusion in a major exhibition or a significant private collection, can also add value.

Examples of Recent Sales & Listings

Couple Kissing in the Backseat: A print of this image sold for approximately $3,500, notes Christie’s.
Cathy by Cigarette Machine: Another print from the series sold for around $2,125 at Swann Auction Galleries.

Magnum Photos Store: Individual fine prints of “Brooklyn Gang” were listed for prices ranging from $4,500 to $15,000.

To determine the exact value of a specific “Brooklyn Gang” print, it is recommended to consult with experts at a major auction house like Phillips, Christie’s, or Swann Auction Galleries.

Given these examples, the $1,500 – $2,000 estimate given by Heritage Auctions is a very fair price. The best tip for buying photographs is buy something that gives you pleasure, that you enjoy looking at and enhances the space where it is displayed.