
Images from a different path
Images from a Different Path
A new change in my website. Just bear with me as I add more images from all the events I attend, and text to this wierd system. I just got tired of writing HTML.
I got too old for that shit!
Efrain John Gonzalez is a photographic artist who's talents with camera and darkroom, has allowed him to document the unusual, the erotic, the unique, the wild and slightly crazy, from the world of body modifications to the underground universe of radical S&M, from sensual beauty of the flesh, to raw sexual desires. An internationally published photographer who for the past 40 years has been traveling down dark and mysterious paths, trying to capture on film, real life images that illustrates a story of people finding the path to their souls, gathering together to celebrate their uncommon lives. His patience has created a rare historical archive of original work, candid photographs of underground clubs, transgender people, tattoo and body modification events, Queer history, cities at night, Political gatherings, leather and fetish cultures.
Along with my more recent photography with digital cameras, I am always creating new galleries from my incredible film archive of over 40 years of B&W and Kodacrome photography, and each month I will try to introduce a new photo showcase of my older work.
BLACK PRIDE
The Black Pride International block party
Held on 127 ST & FREDERICK DOUGLAS BLVD, by the original 4West Lounge, hosted by Legendary Lee Soulja-Simmons. The street was packed and everybody had a rocking time

City Council approves sweeping protections for trans and gender-diverse communities
City Hall NYC
On the steps of city hall on Broadway, there was a gathering to celebrate The City Council on Thursday approving a broad legislative package aimed at strengthening civil rights protections and healthcare access for transgender, gender non-conforming, non-binary, and intersex individuals, marking one of the most comprehensive local efforts in the nation to safeguard gender-diverse communities. The legislation builds on the 2024 passage of New York State’s Equal Rights Amendment, sponsored by Brooklyn Council Member Shahana Hanif. The steps of city hall were filled with the trans activists who were celebrating this law

LA NOUVELLE JUSTINE
at 99 E. 2nd Ave. (betw. Ave. A & 1st Sts.)
LA NOUVELLE JUSTINE at 99 E. 2nd Ave. was an S&M cafe with nightly fetish shows owned by Hayne Suthon and was part of Cave Canem at 24 first ave. It was a fun gritty fetish bar and popular with the goth, vampire, and bondage crowd.

The OSC - 2025
A weekend at the Ontario Suspension Collective
The OSC - 2025 Ontario Suscon - Ontario Suspension Collective — a gathering of body suspension practitioners and enthusiasts from all over the world, here in Southern Ontario at Green Door Studios in Hamilton, Ontario. A fantastic weekend of magnificent people. I had so much fun. And I had lunch at TIM HORTONS!!!

Nights at Speed Limit 55 - 1990
- Speed limit 55 was a bar/restaurent in Chelsea on 26 st 7th ave and Saturday nights became a trans night, with lots of trans women coming to play and party, singing on an improvised stage in the back, and the men who came to share the night with them. One of the women who danced on stage was talented International Chrysis (1951 – 26 March 1990) was an American transsexual actor and singer , famous in Jesus Chrysis Superstar and The Last Temptation of Chrysis. She appeared in the 1990 film Q&A shortly before her death. Chrysis died of liver cancer, attributed to high levels of hormones. - circa 1990.
History with text
A short collection of photos from the archive
Cave Canem
A club on First ave and 2nd st
What a history
2023- APP in Las Vegas
My first trip to Las vegas for the APP/ Association of Professional Piercers weekend. It was Heaven
Wigstock 2025
The Drag march in Thompkins Square Park and on its way to the Stonewall in Sheridan Square. A march of the fantastic
Hellfire Tours
New York City's most original guided tours created from the Hellfirepress.com
Photo Archive of Underground Photojournalist
Efrain John Gonzalez
Efrain John Gonzalez is a photographic artist whose talents with camera and darkroom have allowed him to document and publish the wild and crazy nightlife of New York City's underground club and fetish party scene. He had unique access to some of the kinkiest and over the top events that were popping up all over the Old Meat Packing District when it was still full of red meat, before it was sanitized, cleaned up, and remade into the highest priced district in New York City.
Now, as a fully licensed New York City Tour guide, he is offering truly unique illustrated guided tours in the Meat Packing District and under the High Line, tours that take you back to the good old days of the 80's and 90's, when the district was packed with some of the kinkiest, sleaziest and craziest bars and underground clubs in Manhattan. He invites you to come with him, to walk down those same dark streets and relive a time and culture in this city's past that was forbidden, sleazy, slightly illegal, and loads of fun, a time when movie stars and leather daddies partied the night in Manhattan's most exclusive underground play spaces.
Long vanished clubs such as the infamous HELLFIRE CLUB that started it all in a hidden chamber under the cobblestones of Ninth Ave, The VAULT, whose mob history was made famous in the Village Voice expose, The ANVIL, where preformance artist Ruby Rims wowed the crowds with "her" sexy antics on stage, and MOTHER, an ever changing fetish club who's theme of kink and glamour changed every night. He will personally take you up and down the cobblestone streets and under the High Line where these long gone clubs flourished, where cross-dressing hookers owned the streets, gay men had hot sex in the dark of the abandoned piers, and Dominatrixes walked their collared slaves in broad daylight. With his computer tablet, he can show you actual photographs that he took of these places at the height of their fame, and entrance you with stories of what the famous and infamous did in the backrooms, in the play spaces, and on the stage.
Published Books : Lenny Waller: A Life Underground
The story of Lenny Waller , who ran the infamous HELLFIRE CLUB in the old meatpacking district, and the history of how the Meatpacking District became the center of Fetish and Queer clubs in the 70's, 80's, and ending in 1999. Complete with photos taken in the clubs, maps and intimate details


OLD SCHOOL
A visual history of the New York Tattoo Society from the early 1980's till the turn of the century.