Train-jumping, hitch-hiking, and trudging through edgelands are the primary modes of transport chosen by photographer Mike Brodie and his itinerant young subjects in A Period of Juvenile Prosperity. Documenting Brodie’s traveling community of freedom-seeking adolescents as they bushwhack through the ‘burbs and backwaters of the United States, this new image series will feature in simultaneous shows at Yossi Milo Gallery in New York and M+B in Los Angeles and appear in a monograph published by Twin Palms. Shot spontaneously between 2004 and 2009 across 46 states and over 50,000 formative miles, these photographs have already earned the Arizona-born Brodie a 2007 Baum Award for emerging photographers and a museum exhibition in Massachusetts and California. In the meantime Brodie turned his focus towards becoming a mobile diesel mechanic, trading in the SX-70 Time-Zero film that earned him the moniker “The Polaroid Kidd” for the silver 1993 Dodge Ram truck out of which he now works. “I like machinery, big wheels and engines and dirt and grime and industry,” he says. “The things that turn the wheels of America.” 

What made you choose these subjects initially?
Mike Brodie: It was intuitive—something told me that the world of the train riders was important. I knew I only had one chance to get the photos because soon they would grow up and so would I. Now I don’t want to ride trains anymore.

What have been some of the most compelling places to photograph?
MB: The train bridge that spans Escambia Bay just as your leaving Pensacola, Florida to the east—it’s just beautiful and nostalgic in all the right ways. Also New Orleans, Louisiana. Historically it’s always been a place where travelers congregate but after Hurricane Katrina it opened itself even more. Lots of abandoned spaces and a strange freedom to do whatever you want—people’s imaginations can really run wild there. 

Have you since interacted with your old friends?
MB: Last night at my opening at Yossi Milo, a fellow train rider came and expressed that, despite the fact that I’ve elevated these photos and this culture into the spotlight this way, I’m respected within the traveling community. This meant a lot to me—it’s nice to know that I’m part of something bigger and more important than myself. It’s fuckin’ real.

A Period of Juvenile Prosperity will be on view at Yossi Milo Gallery, New York, and M+B Los Angeles, through May 11. The accompanying monograph is available now from Twin Palms, and in a limited artists edition from TWB.