Last year, Emory University had acquired a collection of approximately 12,000 photographs from long-time collector Robert Langmuir. These images have garnered much attention, as the majority of the pictures are rare depictions of the everyday lives of Black families between the 1800s and the 1960s. The Robert Langmuir African American Photo Collection is scheduled to be open to public viewing beginning mid-July.
Randall Burkett (from left), Curator of African American Collections at Emory University, and grad students Mashadi Matabane and Michael Hall discover an old photo of a woman with a guitar. Matabane's dissertation is on the history of black women and the electric guitar.
Emory lands treasure trove of African American photos
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
By Rosalind Bentley
Sunday, July 8, 2012
“‘This is like throwing the garage door open to African American life,’ said Kevin Young, a curator of literary collections at Emory and National Book Award finalist. ‘Of course there are photos of Frederick Douglass, Sojouner Truth, Father Divine, Martin Luther King and others in here. But what I love is the dailiness of it. For the most part these are regular folks who fixed up and went to the photographer to have their picture made. Or they just took pictures of themselves in their back yards, or at a night club, or a party, or going to work. It’s not just a little bit about a few famous people. And it’s a transformative collection for Emory because it is comprehensive.'”
- Undated fashion photo in front of the Hollywood Hills.
- Club photo from Small Paradise in New York.
“‘Seeing them all at once like I did — and I really only got to see a little bit of them — it’s like trying to drink out of a fire hydrant,’ said Arnika Dawkins, owner and curator of the Arnika Dawkins Gallery in Southwest Atlanta, perhaps the only fine art gallery in town that specializes only in photographs taken by or depicting African Americans. ‘It was overwhelming. But it also gave me a glimpse into a world I wasn’t around to see.'”
- Collector Robert Langmuir says that Howlin’ Wolf (sixth from left) is in this photo of the Parchman Farm Prison Band. He used facial recognition techniques and forensic analysis to back up his claim.
“‘Because race is so overwhelming, even today, there is still a cultural divide,’ [Curator Randall] Burkett said. ‘And in many instances, white folks still don’t know who black folks are. These pictures show the rich cultural, social and organizational life of African Americans, where African Americans are representing themselves as they wanted to be seen and how they saw themselves.'”
- The collection includes photos of Edith Marie Brown (right), who became certified in nursing in Georgia in 1949.
The full article, along with information on where and when this collection is available to the public, can be found here: http://bit.ly/PMDWqj.
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