About the project

February 17 – May 28, 2010

The exhibition The Jazz Loft Project, created by the Performing Arts Museum, celebrated photographer W. Eugene Smith who documented the late-night life in a dilapidated, five-story loft building at 821 Sixth Avenue (between 28th and 29th streets) in New York City’s wholesale flower district. Many musicians, including some of the biggest names in jazz—Charles Mingus, Zoot Sims, Bill Evans, and Thelonious Monk among them—and countless fascinating, underground characters were documented there.

The exhibition evokes the jazz loft through more than 200 images, several hours of audio, and 16mm film footage of Smith working in the loft. Listening stations give access to remastered selections from Smith’s reel-to-reel tapes, which caught everything from rousing jam sessions to historic radio and TV broadcasts, loft conversations, and street noise.

Lead Graphic and Exhibition Designer

The Jazz Loft Project Installation and Opening

Filmed and edited by Courtney Reid-Eaton, exhibitions director at the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University.