Dreamland: Amy Lyne’s Lens on Coney Island

Photographer Amy Lyne gives us her perspective on summer in Brooklyn’s beach town

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n The Summer Issue of Whalebone Magazine we presented a few photographers’ views and perspectives on Coney Island—some of whom have spent decades shooting the storied beachfront, some just a weekend. Photographer Amy Lyne has taken the trip on the R train from her home in Downtown Manhattan many times and documented the result in a hardcover book that you can put on your shelf or coffee table and not even have to smell hot dogs and funnel cake mixed with low tide. Nice of her. You can find Amy in the full feature in The Summer Issue, but let’s take a deeper dive into Amy Lyne’s Coney Island without the risk of hepatitis.

Amy Lyne told Whalebone:

Coney Island is an all you can eat buffet of humanity, a place where your eyes can binge on diversity.

Like the rest of NY, Coney Island has been a victim of gentrification. Its boardwalk has been bought out by big developers, which has encroached on its authenticity. The beach is different though. Its vivacity cannot be tamed.

 

All photos by Amy Lyne from her book Coney Island, published 2017, available at the Strand and Mcnally Jackson in New York, as well as Arcana and Maxfield in Los Angeles and here.