Photographers Tell the Stories of America's Most Maligned City

Everyone knows that Detroit's seen some tough times. But nonetheless, it is and will always be one of America's most culturally significant cities, and while much of what outsiders know of Detroit are tales of woe and economic depression, those tales are far from the whole story. Documenting Detroit wants to share the stories of Detroiters that have gone untold and give emerging artists the chance to hone their craft, all through the medium of photography. Founded by multimedia journalist and Detroit area native Karah Shaffer and photographer Alan Chin, Documenting Detroit is raising funds for a fellowship that will help "documentary photographers from the Detroit area in building their image-making and storytelling skills, by pairing fellows with career photographers and editors from around the country," according to Shaffer. The photos taken by Documenting Detroit fellows will be shared across the city via "a large scale public art installation that includes photographic projections on the sides of downtown skyscrapers, wheat-pasted billboard-sized images," and across the world, through media partners.

The portraits seen here were taken at Documenting Detroit's launch event, and capture some of the diversity of the city.

Documenting Detroit is a program of Facing Change: Documenting America. For more information, and to donate to the Documenting Detroit fellowship, click here.

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