Joe Conzo Jr. is an influential American photographer, author, and retired paramedic. Born in the Bronx, New York, Conzo’s passion for photography began as a child after being introduced to it by his stepfather. Throughout middle school and high school, Conzo developed his photography skills. Some of his early subjects included photographing musicians and friends of his parents. During high school, Conzo began photographing then-amateur hip hop groups and artists, including the Cold Crush Brothers, Afrika Bambaataa, the Treacherous Three, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, The Fearless Four, The Fantastic Five, and more.

These pictures, taken primarily between the 70s and 80s, became some of his best-known work. He gained fame for being the primary photographer who captured the emerging hip-hop scene within the United States. Some of his pictures were included in the documentary From Mambo to Hip Hop: A South Bronx Tale and his collaborative book with New York curator Johan Kugelberg, Born In The Bronx: A Visual Record of the Early Days of Hip Hop. Many of his photographs have been made into a collection housed in a permanent archive at Cornell University.