Oscar Rivera was born in Brooklyn, raised in the South Bronx. He grew up on 140th Street between Cypress Ave and Jackson Ave and spent most of his childhood at Millbrook Houses over by 137th Street and Cypress. Here, at the age of 15, he decided to begin photographing everything. He walked all over the South Bronx without a problem because his artistic skills were in demand by all the local gangs. He created their colors on denim jackets. 20 bucks a jacket! Plus a free travel pass. Oscar graduated from Lehman High School at Tremont Avenue. He attended the School of Visual Arts and then opened his own graphic arts studio – Overnight Type & Graphics with clients including Tommy Boy Records, Arista Records, Lecture Literary Management, and International Disco Records Center. He now lives and works on City Island. In 2020, he started sharing his 35 mm photos of Mott Haven and New York City on Facebook, and the enthusiastic response drove him to publish Off the Rim, a collection of his photos and the memories they sparked. As a Mott Haven History Keeper he plans to expand and continue his research on the South Bronx Football Conference, a community-run football league that played in St. Mary’s Park in the 1970s. He will continue to do what he does best: capture/photograph the many faces and new and old places of today’s Mott Haven.
