Widline Cadet and Rafael Rios on Family, Friendship, and New York

One year after New York City shut down in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Aperture magazine released “New York,” an extraordinary issue honoring the city through photographs and essays by visionary artists and writers, reminding us of how much there is to discover, and relish, when New York comes roaring back. Coinciding with “New York” is a monthlong celebration of NYC at Rockefeller Center featuring a public photography exhibition, virtual talk series, pop-up store and gallery.

Widline Cadet (born in Pétion-Ville, Haiti, 1992) is an artist whose practice draws from personal history and examines race, memory, erasure, migration, and Haitian cultural identity in the United States. She uses photography, video, and installation to construct a visual language that explores notions of visibility and hypervisibility, Black feminine interiority, and selfhood. Cadet is recipient of a number of fellowships, residencies, and awards, including a 2020 Lit List award, 2020 Museum of Contemporary Photography Snider Prize, and 2020 NYFA/JGS Fellowship for Photography. Her work has appeared in the New Yorker, TIME, and Wallpaper*, among other publications. She earned her BA in studio art from the City College of New York, and her MFA from Syracuse University, New York. She is currently based in New York as a 2020–21 artist in residence at the Studio Museum in Harlem.

Rafael Rios (born in Brooklyn, 1982) is a New York­–based photographer and artist. An only child and second-generation immigrant from Puerto Rico, he began shooting on a Minolta 35 mm camera purchased from a local pawnshop at the age of fourteen. His talent was fostered while attending boarding school in Poughkeepsie, New York. Rios spent his weekends as a teenager traveling home by Metro-North train to stay connected with his Fort Greene, Brooklyn, neighborhood and to document his family on film. He earned a BA in visual arts from Hunter College, New York, and afterward, worked as an assistant for some of the industry’s top photographers while honing his craft. Across his work, whether personal or commissioned, Rios is known for his sensitive attention to character and environment that manifests in modern imagery with a candid elegance. His clients include the New York Times, Supreme, Nike, Timberland, GQ, Stüssy, and i-D.

Programming for Aperture’s “New York” issue is made possible by and in collaboration with Rockefeller Center.

Image: Rafael Rios, Mom in her room, 2003; Courtesy the artist