Recently, the Detroit Museum of Art hosted "The New Black Vanguard: Photography Between Art and Fashion" photo exhibition, featuring more than 100 photographs by 15 young African-American photographers from different parts of the world.
Participating photographers include Tyler Mitchell, who shot the cover of the 2018 US vogue for Beyoncé, and Dana Scruggs, the first African-American female photographer to shoot the cover of Rolling Stone magazine, including portraits, concept images and editorial images posted by photographers in magazines, advertising campaigns, and social media.
Dana Scruggs, Nyadhour, Elevated,
Death Valley, California, 2018
Antwaun Sargent, curator, author and art critic of Gagosian, launched the exhibition in collaboration with the Aperture Foundation, not only publishing a companion book, but also interviewing several exhibiting photographers. On March 10, Antwaun Sargent will host a talk at the Detroit Art Library.
Awol Erizku, Untitled Still Life, 2017
Friends, loved ones, models who are not yet well known, and strangers seen on the street are all captured by these photographers. Although their artistic expressions vary, the works emphasize new narrative approaches, such as queer identities, diversity of body and skin color, and so on.
Arielle Bobb-Willis, Union City, New Jersey, 2018
Campbell Addy’s “Untitled,” New York, 2018
Nancy Barr, a photography curator at the James Pearson Duffy Department of Contemporary Art at the Detroit Art Museum, described the work on display as "incredibly vibrant and vibrant" and that the photographers are making a "tremendous impact" in print and digital media.
Nancy Barr said: "These artists use fashion photography as a medium to show social justice, remembering the history of African Americans in either novel or traditional ways, and truly illustrating the contemporary African-American experience and the recognition of African-American identity. This exhibition and the many social justice messages it conveys, breaking with traditional stereotypes and exploring many different types around African-American culture, I think is unprecedented. ”
Jamal Nxedlana, Johannesburg, 2019
Micaiah Carter, Adeline in Barrettes, 2018
For the long-standing debate of "fashion-photography-art", Nancy Barr believes that fashion photography as an art form has a long trajectory in the history of photography. She cites Edward Steichen's early work on Vanity Fair, Vogue, and Harper's Bazaar's history of inviting prominent photographers like Man Ray and Louise Dahl-Wolfe to write editorials. She believes that magazines are "places where photographers show what they can do aesthetically, both in terms of composition and content." Since art galleries and museums did not display fashion photography decades ago, magazines became a way for photographers to experiment with aesthetics.
Quil Lemons, New York, 2017
Tyler Mitchell, Untitled (Hijab Couture),
New York, 2019
In her view, these young photographers are trying to "broaden the field so that the African-American experience is universal to the African-American experience, rather than marginalized." Some of the participating photographers published their own magazines out of necessity or for greater creative permission, and it is very rare for African-American photographers to have "control over the creation, editing, and even textual content of visual stories." She believes that these young people are subverting the fashion photography model.
Ruth Ossai, London, 2017
During "The New Black Vanguard," the Detroit Art Museum will also feature "Black Is Beautiful: Kwame Brathwaite" in an adjacent gallery featuring work by legendary photographer Kwame Brathwaite. With this adjacent layout, the museum hopes to help visitors understand the beauty of African Americans celebrated in the 1960s, and then walk into "The New Black Vanguard" exhibition to feel the fashion, beauty and style of contemporary African Americans, and to think about the changes and connections. Nancy Barr speculates that young visitors will see a lot of what they identify with in the exhibition, while older visitors will learn about how young people want to change their ways of expression and identity.
Adrienne Raquel’s “Gold Finger,”
Nancy Barr said: "Detroit is the most populous city of African Descent in the United States. We hope that through this exhibition, we can reach out to the African-American community and the young people in it, so that more audiences can understand our respect for design and creators." She hopes that the Detroit Art Museum will attract a younger, more diverse audience, a place for young people to learn about new works, new photography, and contemporary art, and gain emotional and cognitive recognition. WWD
Written by Rosemary Feitelberg
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