Chinatown is set within one of the oldest neighborhoods of Manhattan, once known as the infamous Five Points District, the most dangerous slum area of immigrant New York. In the 1960s, the population of Chinatown exploded, expanding into what once was known as Little Italy and the Lower East side, but gentrification is raising rents, and many Chinese are now moving to Queens and Brooklyn. The narrow side streets of the original Chinatown are lined with 19th century tenements and shops, such as the one in this photograph. I built this image around the dilapidated wooden molding that frames a set of windows holding a poster displaying a large close-up photo of a newborn infant. I can’t read Chinese, so I don’t know what cause or service the poster relates to, but its mysterious power is invisible to the woman who passes into my frame. She seems oblivious to everything but the music that fills the buds of her iPod. The image, which became even more mysterious after I abstract it by converting it to black and white, offers more questions than answers. What does the baby represent? Does the woman, who is not Chinese, live here, or is she a visitor, as I was? And what stories could this frayed and worn building tell us if it could speak?