Full Statement about the Black Lives Matter movement
The Black Lives Matter movement was born from the fires of a righteous rage that demands that the world (and in particular America) acknowledges the many casual ways in which we have perpetuated the devastatingly destructive myth that black lives and black bodies are not inherently valuable or as worthy or as sacred as that of white lives and bodies. This poisonous myth has been perpetuated and is evident in nearly every corner of life in this country and not merely limited to the disproportionate destruction of black lives and black bodies by a deeply broken law enforcement system. It also calls for a long overdue reckoning with our nation’s profound ugly inheritance of racism and white supremacy. That reckoning calls on ALL of us to shake loose the suffocating bonds of injustice. In part by acknowledging that people of color (and in particular the black people of this nation) demand liberation from the chains that have tied their ankles to the dehumanizing post of white supremacy that have limited their potential and prospects since the start of this nation to fairly seek after “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness”. Just as critically (or perhaps more importantly) this reckoning calls on the white people of this nation to unflinchingly be introspective both at a deeply personal level and nationally about the unassailable truth that their own throats have been chained to that same ugly post of white supremacy since the day their ancestors decided to first strike that post deep into the ground of American history. White people need to free themselves from the devastatingly destructive chains of white supremacy too.
I have spent a good part of my career as a documentary photographer of human life, seeking to create dignified and humanizing images of people of color the world over. Why? For many reasons, but in part because growing up as a person of color in this country I rarely saw visual examples of people of color that weren’t a racist trope or caricature or images of dark bodies that weren’t meant as a form of entertainment for the masses. Black lives and the lives of other people of color are of course a great deal more nuanced and multi-layered and just as profoundly complicated and full of love and struggle than what we all have been led to believe for far too long. So in this photography series I want to show people of color (mostly black lives and black bodies) going about the beautifully ordinary and yet still profoundly complicated and nuanced act of living in our world. As parents and children. As friends and strangers. As students and professionals. As artists and as advocates and so much more. There never should be need for humanizing images of any peoples, but here we are in 2020, a year that has never been more clear to me in my lifetime, that the need still exists to help humanize the rest of us to a white world. It is a world that I want to help dismantle and then do my small part to help rebuild. Some of these images are taken from a project I worked on recently about healing from sustained trauma in collaboration with Drexel University’s Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice at their School of Public Health and some are from projects that I and a Philadelphia creative agency that seeks to promote works of peace and justice called Mighty Engine have collaborated on. And others still are taken from various documentary projects I’ve done for other orgs or personally around the world. I desire for the days of peace and serenity, but not until justice is a reality for ALL.
I have tried to turn off comments for this series on social media (where I am able to turn it off) because the focus isn’t about if you like or don’t like my photography. It’s not about affirming my words and this series or why you disagree with what I wrote or what I will post. The goal of this is to help us to sit with these images and marvel at the simple truth that the people in them (and others who look like them) are indeed beautiful and deserving of love.
Andrew Huth