As the past week of protests over George Floyd’s death reminded us, this is a time of very needed reckoning where each of us must come to terms with the inequality that underpins our society. Systemic and institutionalized racism exist in America and must be ended by conscious, collective action demanding change. We can begin with persistent self-examination, while pursuing continuing self-education, and relationship building that affirms dignity. We must take daily, concrete, measurable steps to make a difference. We cannot tolerate silence, signaling indifference, as a response to the systemic racism present in our nation.
ASMP believes that a new and challenging American conversation must take place on the national, local and personal levels if we are to address racism and the systems that perpetuate its effects. As a professional community we have a powerful collective voice. As visual artists, we have the means to shine light where there is darkness.
ASMP’s stance on anti-racism, that any racism of any kind among our members or colleagues in our industry will not be tolerated.
View our ASMP Member Code of Conduct
Links to useful resources in relation to racism and photography, drawing on the links curated by those who are expert in these areas, and those who are directly affected. ASMP shouldn’t be an expert on this but we can offer our platform for people who are experts to share their voices, such as our partner organizations listed below.
Cross-posted from baltimoresun.com [by Colin Campbell] Devin Allen, the West Baltimore photographer whose photo of the unrest over the death of Freddie Gray ran on the front of Time magazine, is back on the cover, five years later. Allen, the inaugural Gordon Parks Foundation Fellow, took his latest Time cover photo, of people lying on the street during a Black Trans Lives Matter protest in downtown Baltimore, on June 5. The headline, “The Overdue Awakening,”…
Dear Friends, Gordon Parks never met George Floyd but they knew the same struggle, they knew the corrosive toll of racism, they knew what it meant to live under the veil of suspicion and violence from people charged with protecting their lives. Gordon Parks and George Floyd had something else in common: the city of Minneapolis. George Floyd left Houston for the Twin Cities in 2014, searching for a better life just as Gordon Parks…
