Josh Katz was no different than you or me when the lockdown happened. He was a freelance photographer who was bored in his New York apartment during the pandemic lockdown. So, he decided to do something about his boredom and contacted his neighbors to see if they were willing to participate in his project.

Josh began photographing his fellow New Yorkers on their apartment building rooftops and balconies as they led their quarantine lives. Each rooftop had their own unique hobby or activity, and Josh would capture those special moments with his camera and drone. He documented his progress on TikTok, and his page became a popular one pretty quickly due to the entertainment of New York City residents’ boredom. (You know, because everyone was stuck at home.) So as his TikToks became more and more well-known, he got the idea to make his photography project into a whole photography book that documented his neighbors during the pandemic.

That photography book is being published as a charity project, where donations on the book’s ordering website go 100% towards charity. An excerpt from Josh on this website states: “When NYC emerged as a pandemic hotbed, rooftops became our only respite from cramped apartments; our only escape into the outside world. Since the beginning of quarantine, I have spent hundreds of hours photographing the rise of roof culture from my rooftop in Bushwick, Brooklyn.” His goal is to make this book a part of 2020’s history by being authentic with his followers about his goals.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/joshkatz/new-york-in-quarantine-rooftop-culture-through-crisis