Getty Museum Focuses on Photography and the Black Arts Movement

Photography and the Black Arts Movement, 1955-1985, on view at The J. Paul Getty Museum operating February 24 via June 14 will have a look at the various methods images fostered Black empowerment and propelled social change.

“It will bring together works by more than 100 photographers, painters, graphic designers, and multimedia artists who used photographic images in their struggles against inequality,” said Timothy Potts, Maria Hummer-Tuttle and Robert Tuttle Director of the J. Paul Getty. “The works in this exhibition show how a wide range of artists and activists tapped the power of photography to strengthen respect for Black community and culture. Amid the turbulence of the mid-20th century, they found powerful ways of using photography to support and advance social justice.”  

Highlights include photographic portraits and self-portraits by Kwame Brathwaite, Mikki Ferrill, Barkley Hendricks, and Carla Williams, plus photographs in magazines and newspapers showed how people throughout the African diaspora dressed, ate, rested, worked, and played, highlighting the ways in which stylistic choices reflected political concerns.

Divided into eight sections, this exhibition brings together more than 150 artworks including contact sheets, newsletters, and magazines to give a sense of the varied ways that photographic imagery circulated at the time.

The ‘Representing the Community’ section focuses on the 1960s and how amid the height of civil rights movements across the African diaspora, photography became an invaluable tool for promoting self-determination through self-representation. Meanwhile ‘Activists’ shows that photographic documentation was essential in garnering public support and providng coverage of the civil rights movement. “California Connections” will consider the work and networks that contributed to Southern California’s function within the Black Arts Movement.