Yeshe McKenna
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‘Changing New York’ Slideshow by Yeshe McKenna 2026
Summary;
This body of work is drawn from a personal family archive of photographs
taken in New York City during the late 1990s and early 2000s.
The project explores the transformative experience of migrating across the
world and falling in love with a new city, how such movement can
shape identity, creative vision, and emotional life.
Through these images, McKenna reflects on living boldly
and expansively, embracing a life too complex to be contained by a single
narrative. The photographs move through joy, romance, fear, and death,offering an intimate
glimpse into a lived world defined by intensity, vulnerability and connection.
Research;
The work is informed by a lineage of New York based artists whose practices were rooted
in lived experience and emotional truth. The heart of this research is the
influence of Nan Goldin, whose radically honest
photographic language reshaped contemporary documentary practice.
Goldin’s commitment to recording life as it unfolded without staging,
manipulation or aesthetic distance established
a model of photography as personal testimony.
This approach underlines McKenna’s understanding of the archive
as a living record shaped by intimacy and trust.
Context;
McKenna’s uncle, John Marchant, was a close friend and longtime studio manager to
Nan Goldin in both New York and Paris. Many of the
photographs presented were taken by Marchant
and depict figures who also appear in Goldin’s work.
Through this family connection,
McKenna has access to previously unseen images from Goldin’s extended
circle and includes an original work by Goldin in the project. McKenna
also lived in Goldin’s former live-work space
at 334 Bowery, a site where many photographs from
The Ballad of Sexual Dependency were made. Revealing striking
parallels in subject matter: chosen family, love, addiction, survival and emotional truth.
All works are shown with full consent.
Process;
The photographs were preserved on 35mm slide film and remained unseen for over twenty years.
McKenna carefully revisited the archive using a Kodak slide projector,
selecting and editing the images into a slideshow. This process honour
s the materiality of the medium and highlights the importance of preserving memory as evidence,
an act of witnessing that connects personal history to a broader photographic legacy.
Summary;
This body of work is drawn from a personal family archive of photographs
taken in New York City during the late 1990s and early 2000s.
The project explores the transformative experience of migrating across the
world and falling in love with a new city, how such movement can
shape identity, creative vision, and emotional life.
Through these images, McKenna reflects on living boldly
and expansively, embracing a life too complex to be contained by a single
narrative. The photographs move through joy, romance, fear, and death,offering an intimate
glimpse into a lived world defined by intensity, vulnerability and connection.
Research;
The work is informed by a lineage of New York based artists whose practices were rooted
in lived experience and emotional truth. The heart of this research is the
influence of Nan Goldin, whose radically honest
photographic language reshaped contemporary documentary practice.
Goldin’s commitment to recording life as it unfolded without staging,
manipulation or aesthetic distance established
a model of photography as personal testimony.
This approach underlines McKenna’s understanding of the archive
as a living record shaped by intimacy and trust.
Context;
McKenna’s uncle, John Marchant, was a close friend and longtime studio manager to
Nan Goldin in both New York and Paris. Many of the
photographs presented were taken by Marchant
and depict figures who also appear in Goldin’s work.
Through this family connection,
McKenna has access to previously unseen images from Goldin’s extended
circle and includes an original work by Goldin in the project. McKenna
also lived in Goldin’s former live-work space
at 334 Bowery, a site where many photographs from
The Ballad of Sexual Dependency were made. Revealing striking
parallels in subject matter: chosen family, love, addiction, survival and emotional truth.
All works are shown with full consent.
Process;
The photographs were preserved on 35mm slide film and remained unseen for over twenty years.
McKenna carefully revisited the archive using a Kodak slide projector,
selecting and editing the images into a slideshow. This process honour
s the materiality of the medium and highlights the importance of preserving memory as evidence,
an act of witnessing that connects personal history to a broader photographic legacy.