Photographer Mitch Epstein Captures NYC’s Clouds and Rocks

Mitch Epstein is a Cooper Union–trained fine-art photographer. But he’s something of a meteorologist, too. For the dozen large-format black-and-whites in “Rocks and Clouds,” at the Yancey Richardson Gallery in Chelsea, he would consult the nine weather apps on his iPhone to help determine the likelihood of cloud activity on a given day. Should the formations look formidable, he’d grab his 8-by-10 field camera and head off to shoot in the city’s five boroughs and beyond. “Rocks and clouds are opposites—hard and soft, dense and porous—but formations on the ground often mirror the sculptural qualities of a billowing sky,” he says of the exhibit’s two subjects. “This series explores how geology shapes cities and the spectrum of time through the ephemerality of clouds.” Sounds solid to us.