In a city of the image-obsessed, nightlife photography can be an exercise in debauched vanity: an opportunity for sponsorship, or at least a few Instagram tags. But the following photographers push past gang signs and pursed-lip posturing (though you can’t avoid those completely) to showcase the city’s underbelly, the DIY dens in Brooklyn where styles and trends are born. Music, skateboarding, costumed queers, beer brawls, police raids—blessed be those that sacrifice their after-hours to capture it all.
