Renowned for his restrained yet affecting photographs, Mark Steinmetz captures a palpable sense of displacement and isolation, particularly among young Americans. For South Central, he worked in and around Knoxville, Tennessee, drawing its title from the South Central Bell telephone company that served the area. Public payphones recur throughout the book, standing as quiet markers of the region’s social and economic landscape.

Steinmetz has a rare ability to hold contradiction within a single frame, bringing together awkwardness, aggression and tenderness without resolving them. In South Central, these elements accumulate into something close to a visual novel, where the human condition is observed with clarity, patience and emotional weight.