Roland L. Freeman was an American photographer devoted to recording the lives of rural and urban African Americans. Freeman’s photographs are a collection of the social history beginning from his view, with the era of the civil rights movement Using his camera as both a research tool and a medium for his creative voice, Freeman moved through depths of the rural South. He gained the trust of Black craftsmen ands working men, who allowed him to photograph intimate details of their lives. He presented the world with a specific view of how African Americans see themselves in the world and also the life of small town citizens and how satisfied they were with their working lives. After the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther Kind Jr in 1968, Freeman did a project photographing the mule-train march of the Poor People’s Campaign that went on despite its leader being violently shot down. He catalogued their march after being hired by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, from Mississippi to Washington D.C.. That experience cemented his commitment to be a witness documentarian of the changes in the lives of Black Americans as new civil rights legislation opened doors that previously were closed to them. His message to me is to always be a witness and to use my voice not just my eyes. It is important to me present in the world as a citizen. It is also just as important to speak up about the issues that you witness. Being present isn’t just a requirement to being an activist. I will be posting my photos to my Tumblr because that is the platform that I have the largest voice on. I hope to show people that injustice happens all over and to all types of people but that black people in America are frequently discriminated against.
Kerry James Marshall is also an American artist. He uses multiple mediums to express his voice like: paintings, sculptures, collages, videos, and photographs. His goal is to voice on the history of black identity both in the United States and in Western world through art. By using narrative scenes, he is able to create a voice from both from history and using his own life experiences. Marshall is able to display into moments and objects important to present and past aspects of black culture. He was born in Alabama in 1955 and is know to express his geographical relation of the Black Panther Headquarters having a serious impact on his activism and shaped his creative voice as an artist. Marshall often challenges the marginalization of Black Americans through his art. Having his art be in his words, “unequivocally, emphatically black” is one of the main aspects of his person. One of his sole purposes for his art is to force the recognition of the discrimination and active methods of overlooking the importance of a black persons experioance in the western world primarily in America. His work inspires me to always continue to be unapologetically black. My work is constantly focused on the different aspects of black life and culture. I have learned from his activism that there is always a place for my blackness in art, even if I felt that there was not one in the world.
Freeman, Roland L, photographer. Roland L. Freeman portfolio. [S.l.: Roland L. Freeman and Diogenes, 1997]
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