Staged? Documentary? Somewhere between the two? It’s hard to tell with the San Franciscan photography of Travis Jensen, but there is a reality to even his most unlikely images – a quality that has developed through his experiences in his adopted city.
The Californian city has thrown both the good and the bad at street photographer Jensen, and both seem to have stuck with him. Coming out of the skateboard scene, he has risen to become a pre-eminent visual voice of San Francisco, and been published in every print title worth its salt. Seen from the outside as a carefree city of freedom, Jensen shows us something beneath the veneer; yes there are smiling faces, but also haunting looks that betray an unsettling disquiet. There’s a gazillion photos of his Barbary Coast Now exhibition happening at Gensler Art in San Francisco on their Facebook page – get yourselves in the frame on Harrison Street while the show runs until 29th June.