Documentary Photos By Peter Beste

In that, new cultures have sprouted within those pockets of the city. The neighborhoods of South Park, Fifth Ward and Third Ward have, over the space of the last thirty years, produced a culture centered around rap music that has flourished independently, in the process creating a sustainable economy of its own within the city limits. Houston has developed its own musical genres (the slowed-down sounds of DJ Screw and the horrorcore of Ganksta NIP and the Geto Boys), cultivated a car culture (slabs, candy paint, custom rims) and innovative approach to jewelry (diamond-encrusted mouthpieces known as grills), a homegrown vice (Codeine Promethazine cough syrup mixed with soda) and has encouraged an entrepreneurial spirit that has become commonplace among its artists. This has resulted in an independent scene where artists promote and release their own records, selling them directly to the fans to eliminate the middlemen and keep the money in the community.
The purpose of this photos is to provide an intimate look into the hearts, minds and lives of a fiercely independent and often misrepresented group of individuals who live on the outskirts–both physically and ideologically–of the social and economic experiment known as Houston.
Despite the national publicity and the millions of records sold by some of Houston’s rap artists since the early 1980s, these pockets of Houston remain for the most part hidden and closed to outsiders. It is in this environment that Peter Beste and myself have spent the last 6 years earning the trust of this community, gaining exclusive access during one of the most transitional periods of the last century. This collection of perspectives through photographs and interviews provides a window into an autonomous culture that so few understand, even within the city from which that culture is sprung.