Ricky Powell
Cover for Issue 286
Los Angeles
Issue 286 August 19, 2008

For two decades, Ricky Powell has prowled the streets of NYC, toured the world with hip-hop's biggest acts, and crashed celebrity-studded parties on both coasts while equipped with only his wits and an instamatic camera. Powell has elbowed his way into the center of the scene with no shame: "It's for public access," Powell can be heard saying while pleading for an interview with a pizza-shop owner on his cable-TV show, "Rappin' with the Rickster."

Powell knows that access is everything, and he delivers it to those who don't have his connections. His photography has appeared in the New York Times, the New York Post, and the Village Voice, as well as in a host of national magazines. In 2005, powerHouse books published Public Access: Ricky Powell Photographs 1985-2005. In the collection, Powell depicts the actors, musicians, performers, and artists that inspire him, among them '80s art superstar Keith Haring.

Powell is a native New Yorker who graduated from Hunter College. He currently lives and works on the Lower East Side.

 

Ricky Powell
The Incredible Keith, 2002
Courtesy powerHouse Books

 

View more images! Take a look at Artkrush's most recent slideshow and Activate's The Week in Pictures.

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