CONEY ISLAND MERMAIDS

These images are from my ongoing project documenting the participants in the annual Mermaid Parade held in Coney Island, Brooklyn. I began photographing the parade in 1996 and immediately fell in love with it's unique sense of community and homemade revelry. The photography works toward taking the subjects out of the gritty, noisy environment of Coney Island and pushes the viewer to look beyond the pageantry to the individuals inside their costumes.