Clique : West Coast Portraits From The Hood

Beginning in 1980, Merrick Morton set about going to East and South Central Los Angeles - traveling as far as San Diego - to document street gang culture. As an outsider from the San Fernando Valley, Morton was always interested in cultures that were different from his own. The folks in these neighbourhoods immediately took to Rick and his quizzical eye, allowing him to move among them freely and affording him unrestricted access to their lives. Clique: West Coast Portraits from the Hood, 1980-1996, Morton's first monograph, is comprised of two-decades worth of photographs wherein he documents these communities, some of which have been largely ignored by the mainstream media, and captures their spirit. With this collection, he strove to keep the cultural identity of these neighbourhoods and their inhabitants intact, rendering their stories in poignant black-and-white and colour photography. Their family heritage is unmistakable in the still yet moving moments. Inspired by the work of