Street life offers boundless opportunities to create vital, compelling photographs. Street photography remains one of the most dynamic and accessible forms of contemporary image-making, where chance encounters and observation reveal stories hidden in plain sight.
Join Harvey Stein and the Griffin Museum of Photography for a dynamic, small-cohort online intensive. With more than 50 years of experience photographing public life, and decades of teaching street photography, Stein brings a mentorship-driven approach rooted in curiosity, craft, and personal expression.
The workshop includes concise lectures, live demonstrations, curated image presentations, and individual portfolio reviews of each participant's street work. A special guest artist will also present their practice and insights.
Core topics include:
-- Approaching and engaging with strangers
-- Overcoming shyness in public-space photography
-- Candid vs. directed and confrontational techniques
-- Posing, interaction, and ethical observation
-- Exposure, metering, and working with available light
-- Daylight flash and the creative use of portable lighting
-- Developing a personal visual voice while honoring narrative truth
Designed for photographers looking to begin or advance their street practice, this workshop offers practical tools, renewed confidence, and creative inspiration. Leave with a deeper understanding of street photography and a clearer, more intentional approach to making meaningful images in public life.
© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein© Harvey Stein
All photos are from Briefly Seen New York Street Life ©Harvey Stein 2015
Class Details
Dates: Two sessions on Saturday and Sunday: February 7 and 8, 2026
Time: 10:00 AM-5:00 PM EST (with a 1-hour lunch break)
Format: Online, over Zoom
Participants: Limited to 12
Course Fee: $365 (members) / $415 (non-members)
Level: Open to All!
About the Instructor
Harvey Stein is a long-time faculty member at The International Center of Photography who has also taught at The School of Visual Arts, Parsons, Rochester Institute of Technology, Drew University and the Los Angeles Center of Photography. For the past 21 years (except for 2020-2022), he has conducted travel photo workshops to such places as Italy, Mexico, Peru, Ecuador, Argentina, Southeast Asia, India, China and Greece; he lectures on photography worldwide. He has been the Director of Photography at Umbrella Arts Gallery (NYC) since 2009 until 2019 when it closed due to losing its lease. Stein has had 92 solo exhibitions and has participated in over 170 group shows. Stein's tenth book Coney Island People 50 Years was published September. 2022. Other books of Stein's photographs include Parallels: A Look at Twins, E.P. Dutton (1978); Artists Observed, Harry Abrams, Inc. (1986); Coney Island, W.W. Norton, Inc. (1998); Movimento: Glimpses of Italian Street Life, Gangemi Editore, Rome (2006); Coney Island 40 Years, Schiffer Publishing, (2011); Harlem Street Portraits, Schiffer Publishing (2013); Briefly Seen New York Street Life, Schiffer Publishing (2015); Mexico Between Life and Death, Kehrer Verlag (Germany, 2018), and Then and There: Mardi Gras 1979, Zatara Press (2020). Stein's work exists in 60 public collections; he is represented by Sous Les Etoiles Gallery in NYC. View some of Harvey's photographs at www.harveysteinphoto.com and on Instagram @stein.harvey