Photographing COVID-19 on the Philadelphia Landscape: Responses, Realities, Silences, and Reactions

ABSTRACT

In early January 2020, the World Health Organization announced that a mysterious pneumonia like illness. It was first observed in Wuhan China and was likely caused by a previously unknown coronavirus. By late January, cases of the unknown virus had been detected in several countries throughout the world. In March of that year, the WHO officially declared COVID-19 a global pandemic. After overtaking many countries throughout the world in terms of number of cases and deaths, a national emergency was declared in the United States. Schools began closing, parks were empty, restaurants vacant, businesses closed, churches posted notices that in-person services were ‘canceled until further notice, ' stringent stay at home orders were imposed and the streets were deserted. As someone who has been taking pictures of street life for many years, the usual hustle and bustle of the street was eerily disconcerting. This photo-essay provides a glimpse of the responses, realities, silences, and reactions to COVID-19 on the landscape. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.