In high school I began taking photographs that captured the everyday lives of Black people in Greater Englewood. This South Side neighborhood has been my home since I was born. My friends used to joke that my photo-covered locker was like a “little museum” of us “kickin’ it.” I feel a reflection of that kind of joy when I see people dancing in the pictures Mikki Ferrill made at The Garage (fig. 1). But as a teenager searching for validation of my artistic path, I had no idea that there was a historic tradition of photography like mine. I only saw stereotypical (usually trauma-centered) depictions of Black lives in museums. I could not have imagined photography like mine being treated as museum-worthy art. Still, my passion for my art and my community kept me motivated.
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Even before high school, I loved photography. I remember how it felt to see pictures of my parents as young teenagers in love. I remember being photographed by my dad, who loved taking pictures of me. James Stricklin captures this feeling in his tender portraits of kids playing and hanging out (fig. 2). Photos like these are literal proofs of love.
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As I progressed in my career, I grew more and more fond of the way people react to being photographed by an artist from their neighborhood. I remember taking a photo of a young man skateboarding in a bow tie in Greater Englewood. He seemed so pleased that I wanted to capture his elegant style and proud smile. Frank Stewart’s images illuminate this same sense of confidence (fig. 3); people feel special when a photographer makes room for them to feel good about being themselves, as opposed to scrutinizing them for their criminal history or hard life.
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The history told in this publication is one of mentorship and community strength. When I was a high school junior, Ovie Carter, the Pulitzer Prize–winning Chicago Tribune photographer, became my mentor. He told me, “You have an eye,” and he gave me his Nikon FM2 and some of his old lenses to replace my Pentax. It is hard to express the confidence I felt taking pictures with Ovie Carter’s camera and lenses—he taught me what it means to be a successful artist. When I was accepted to Columbia College in 1997, I decided with Mr. Carter’s guidance to major in journalism instead of photography: “You’re already a photographer,” he told me. “A degree in journalism will prove to people that you understand the news profession and that you have a valid point of view. Then all you have to do is show them your pictures. You don’t need a degree to be a photographer.”4

In my journalism classes I learned that crime and struggle were the primary focus in news about neighborhoods like mine. But that tragic narrative has never matched my lived experience of my home, and I would never invade the traumatic experiences of anyone anywhere for my art. As I learned of these limitations on depictions of Black lives, I decided to create a different kind of photography. The Englewood Rising Project, developed by Englewood residents and activists and paid for by funds they raised, showcased the everyday beauty of Black life on billboards throughout the neighborhood featuring my images (see fig. 4). A different collection of photographs of local people and places went up each month from April 2017 to March 2018. After that, I created From the INside, a collection of photographs that continued to celebrate the love and beauty in my community. The series was exhibited at the Harold Washington Library Center from April 1 to June 4, 2017, alongside poetry by Tara Betts and Meida McNeal. By portraying Black people living their day-to-day lives—as opposed to mired in isolated moments of crisis—such photographs also defy the typical, negative stereotypes about us.
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Soon after, in 2018, I completed work on my Folded Map project. For this multimedia project, I introduced people from the predominantly white North Side of the city to people with a corresponding address on the same street, fifteen miles away on the predominantly Black South Side. Even though they lived on the same street in the same city, the extreme racial segregation of the North and South sides meant that these people would likely never have met outside this project. I videotaped their conversations and created photographic portraits of these “map twins” (see fig. 5) in front of their homes to personalize the experience of segregation—not only for the participants but also for audiences, who can engage with the pictures and interviews on the project website. Folded Map illuminates not only the damage caused by segregation but also the healing power of simply visiting other neighborhoods and making friends with new people, as all of the map twins did. Once we know more about each other, we care more about each other.
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My most recent project, Inequity for Sale, begun in 2021, is a different kind of tribute to my neighborhood. A 2018 study published by Duke University found that 75–95 percent of homes sold to Black families in Chicago during the 1950s and 1960s were offered through deceptive land sale contracts. Via this scam, speculators bought up homes to sell on contract at an average 84 percent markup to Black families, who were largely unaware that they did not actually own the home. According to the study, entitled “The Plunder of Black Wealth in Chicago,” more than six hundred homes in Greater Englewood were sold in this manner.^[1] I created and installed land markers in front of several of these homes that were legally stolen from aspiring Black homeowners in Greater Englewood, with the goal of highlighting the damage caused by racist land sale contracts. The bold black-and-yellow markers included the names of the Black buyers and the date of their purchase, along with the declaration, “This crime was never brought to justice. Reparations are due.”7

Talented Black photographers have documented the beauty of Black life throughout the medium’s history, but their work has mostly been hidden from public view. Until you see Black photography celebrated in a place like the Art Institute of Chicago—where I saw the photographs in this catalogue for the first time as part of the 2018 exhibition Never a Lovely So Real: Photography and Film in Chicago, 1950–1980—you cannot really imagine yourself occupying that space. To see a reflection of yourself in a photograph is invaluable; it creates a sense of belonging to a shared history that involves but ultimately transcends struggle. Black artists enable Black people to see their authentic selves as art. I hope that my work will do this for others the way these photographers did it for me. 8

People in the United States have been programmed to believe that Black Americans lack any culture or history beyond slavery. This is not true. We have many distinct Black cultures in our country, including an inner-city Chicago Black culture. Many of the photographs included in this book look just like my neighborhood today. The way we dress, hang out, and use our porches is beautiful; witnessing this beauty, in real life or in a photograph, celebrates the reality of Black neighborhoods. Black everydayness can and should be framed as art. An image of a Black woman standing around with a group of laughing Black kids reminds us that we are not less than; more accurately, we are less represented than.9

We need proof of love, community, and the extraordinary power of everyday people of color enjoying their life amid the chaos of racism. The images in this book are proof that we are proud of who we are—extraordinary people living beautiful lives, defying forces meant to diminish them.10