Basketball Photography Gallery

Basketball Art - Photography Prints

Someone recently shared the Netflix trailer with me for Rez Ball - a movie about a basketball team on an America Indian Reservation in Shiprock, New Mexico. Which got me thinking about this fine art basketball photography series I’ve been shooting for the past 13+ years. After driving 300,000+ miles all over the USA, I can say there isn’t a pocket of this country where you won’t find the sport, but nothing is more dense with basketball hoops then Reservations across the American West!

It’s been a while since my last post of basketball hoop photographs despite the American Backcourts series continuing. So here are a few images made during recent road trips. If you’d like to see photographs of basketball hoops on Indian Reservations, click HERE to visit the main gallery for this project.

And click HERE to purchase fine art basketball hoop prints for your home, office, or commercial space.

Basketball hoop in front of a dilapidated house in Upstate New York

Homemade basketball hoop on a telephone pole - Utah

Weeds growing through the cracks of an outdoor basketball court in Massachusetts

Fine art photograph of a basketball court on the Llano Estacado in Texas

Markings on an old barn where a basketball hoop once hung on a farm in West Virginia

Black and white photograph of a basketball rim hung on a tree stump with no backboard in Upstate New York

Photograph of an outdoor basketball court in a small Western Massachusetts town

Photograph of a basketball hoop on an old ranch in Colorado

Llano Estacado Photos

Photographs of the Llano Estacado - Texas

The Llano Estacado is steeped in Texas mythology and comes up frequently in historic books, cattle ranching lore, and country songs. To the uninformed eye it can appear as a boring section of flat land, but “The Staked Plains” are a fascinating region of the United States that encompasses 37,452 square miles of the Texas Panhandle and Eastern New Mexico. It’s one of the largest tablelands on the entire continent of North America and feels impossibly flat. So much so that you’d assume it must be at or below sea level, but it’s lowest point is 3,000 ft in the southeast. From there is goes up at a uniform 10 ft per mile, reaching 5,000ft at it’s most northwest point. I’ve personally never been anywhere else in the world that exudes the same kind of energy as the Llano. To be in it makes you feel incredibly small but also free. There would be very little convincing needed for me to do a long term project focused solely on it. For now though, I’m going to do some research to find a wordsmith that somehow managed to describe such a place.

“It’s a long way, round the Llano Estacado” - Colter Wall

Llano Estacado - Texas 

Black and white photograph of a farm on the Llano Estacado 

Black and white photo of the Llano Estacado 

Photo of. a dust storm on the Llano Estacado in Texas 

Photo of roadside religious crosses on the Llano Estacado in Texas 

Photograph of a long dirt road on the Llano Estacado in Texas

Black and white photograph of a farm in the Texas panhandle 

Photograph of wind turbines on the Llano Estacado 

North Carolina Barbershop

Traditional Barbershop - Photography

The American Barbershop - Wall Art

These photographs of the Granville Barbershop in Granville, North Carolina were made during a drive home to upstate NY for Christmas. The owner was very skeptical of my intentions at first but agreed to let me photograph his shop. During my time there I had some fun interactions with customers, but he never said much. As far as history goes, the shop opened in the 1940’s, and prior to that it was an African American movie theater!! How’s that for Southern?

As with most old shops, the relationship between proprietor and those in his chair was easy, fluid, and quite candid. At one point an older gentleman sauntered in with his head down, dropped a gift on an empty chair, turned back toward the door and said “well, gotta go”. That was it. No interaction. Never even lifted his head up to make eye contact. The barber didn’t seem surprised, nor did he skip a beat on the haircut in progress.

Took about a half hour until I was pleased with the pictures made. Afterward I gave the barber a card and thanked him for the hospitality. He stopped cutting, grabbed a few coins off the back bar, placed them in my hand and in an almost too good to be true accent said “take these two qwwwaaaaaaaatehs back to that machine and get you a pop. I’ll bet you haven’t had a 50 cent pop in yeeeeaaaaaaahs.” Sure enough, there were ice cold sodas coming out of a vintage Coca Cola machine against the back wall. Can’t tell you the last time I even had the desire for a soda, but I wasn’t about to turn that one down.

Interactions like these are what keep Barbershops of America going. Talking to people that give you a very definitive sense of place is gratifying, educational, and fun. Hearing about the shops history in such a dialect not only tells you where you are in the world, but also where you aren’t. I love that.

Click here to check out my photography book Barbershops of America

Contact me directly about barbershop photography prints for your home, office, or commercial space -rob@robhammerphotography.com

Traditional Barbershop Photography

The Granville Barbershop in Granville, North Carolina

Exterior photograph of a traditional barbershop in North Carolina

Photograph of a barber cutting a customers hair in a traditional barbershop

Barbershop Culture Photography