Photos show the chaotic colour of New York’s streets

• Henry Zwartz

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Photographer Dimitri Mellos was born in Athens, but for more than a decade he has called New York his home.

Mellos, who has won a host of awards and been exhibited in major cities around the world, chose to document his acquired home of New York for his ongoing series I Speak of the City.

Mellos' work focuses on the shapes, shadows and faces of New York City – ranging from the powerful glance of a young girl directly at the camera, her face half obscured by shadow, to the almost comical interaction between two people on a street corner, their faces lit up in a moment of conversation.

"I think street photography is extremely tough to do anywhere, not just in New York, and in fact probably more so in other places," Mellos said of his work.

"To me, walking around the city and, in a manner of speaking, appropriating it through the act of looking carefully and photographing is in fact very much an act of intimacy, and I consider my work very personal – it certainly feels so to me."

Sean Davey, curator at The Photography Room, said: "Dimitri Mellos' photographs … follow in the well-practised tradition of street photography made in New York City. Mellos is drawn to the flow of people on the city's streets. And who can blame him? New York will awaken even the most dormant of gazes."

I Speak of the City is now on show at The Photography Room, Canberra.