Adger Cowans, Footsteps, Harlem, Gelatin silver print, 1961
Adger Cowans (American, b. 1936) is a celebrated photographer whose wide-ranging work includes the civil rights movement, jazz musicians, landscape, and artistic studies of the human form, water, and light. He is also one of the founding members of Kamoinge, a Black photographers collective whose mission is to ‘Honor, document, preserve and represent the history and culture of the African Diaspora with integrity and respect for humanity through the lens of Black Photographers.’ This exhibition, curated by Halima Taha, presents Cowans’s use of photography to articulate the beauty within the human condition and the world we live in with over fifty images from his illustrious career. Integral to Cowan’s work is his conscious effort to remain “close to the natural movement of the universe through the vibrancy of life. I take a picture with my heart, not my eyes. The eyes see what the heart feels.”
