PCPP is pleased to announce a significant acquisition by the Library of Congress of work by Harlem-based photographer and Kamoinge Workshop Member, Shawn Walker. The acquisition included selections from Shawn Walker’s Print Collection and Harlem Experience Ephemera, in addition to work collected by Mr. Walker from other Kamoinge members. The curated collection includes prints, negatives, transparencies, and related ephemera that chronicle the African-American experience from 1963 to the present day.
Born and raised in Harlem, New York, Shawn Walker has led a successful career as a professional photographer and a photographic educator for more than 40 years. Known for his images depicting everyday life in his hometown of Harlem, Walker cites his dual interest in visual art and cultural anthropology as his impetus for photographing his community since his early teenage years. In 1963, a then 23-year-old Shawn Walker joined the Kamoinge Workshop–a Harlem-based collective of African-American photographers–as a founding member where he participated in formative “discussions and lessons on film and printing, photography, jazz, painting, literature and the other arts,” states Walker. His works have since been exhibited in institutions such as The Smithsonian Institute, The Brooklyn Museum, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and published in New York: A History in Images, Reflections in Black: A History of African-American Photographers 1840-1999, and Culturefront.
The Kamoinge Workshop was founded in 1963 as a collective of African-American photographers seeking artistic equality and empowerment in a time of ongoing exclusion of such voices from predominant magazines and other media. Shawn Walker, Roy DeCarava, Louis Draper, Albert Fennar, Ming Smith, Adger Cowans, James Ray Francis, Herman Howard, Earl James, Calvin Mercer, Herb Randall, and James Mannas–held a joint meeting to discuss the need for a space to train and practice as artists and formed Kamoinge as a result. Based in New York City, the collective has met continuously since its founding guided by the leadership of a number of directors including Anthony Barboza, Roy DeCarava, Louis Draper and Beuford Smith. Today, Kamoinge has grown to include new members and continues to function as a forum in which members view, nurture, critique and challenge each other’s work in an honest and understanding atmosphere.
See Shawn Walker’s project page for more information about his work as well as PCPP and Walker’s partnership. Click here to read the Library of Congress’s press release. Click here for more information on the Kamoinge Workshop collective. PCPP is grateful to the support of its staff, interns, board, and donors as well as the staff of the Library of Congress for making this historic acquisition possible.