Chicago’s Nelson Algren

They met in 1949 when Art Shay was a reporter for Life. Shay followed Algren around with his camera, gathering pictures for a photo essay he was pitching to the magazine. Life didn't pick up the piece, but Shay and Algren became fast friends. Algren gave Shay's camera entrance into the back-alley world of Division Street, and Shay enshrined forever the poetry of Algren in motion. They were both realists whose art transcended realism, chronicling the same patch of ground, only with different tools.
Chicago's Nelson Algren is the photographic record of a world now lost - well known pictures mixed together with others discovered recently and published here for the first time - and of two friends who transformed that world into art, making the miracle appear effortless and fun. Art Shay's homage in pictures to a writer and his city is also Nelson Algren's friendship with a photographer and his city.