Sixteen years ago
100,000 gang members, 1,000 gangs, nearly 600 people killed. Those were LA County’s numbers in 1992. Sixteen years later, CAL/GANG stats tell a tale of containment.
In the early nineties, freelance photographer Joseph Rodriguez received a grant from the Alicia Patterson Fellowship to photograph the gangs of East Los Angeles. The images he captured draw you right into the living room, where you can smell the carpet and share in the distress.
Chivo, an East Los Angeles gang member, teaches his daughter how to hold a 32-caliber pistol. Her mother, Yvonne, looks on. Photo by APF Fellow Joseph Rodriguez
Rodriguez writes:
I see Los Angeles as a post-modern Wild West where everyone has a gun and they use it. It is like an uncontrolled and slightly scary place, a land of dreams and beauty, playing by its own rules.
