Blackness

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David Alekhuogie Sees Blackness at the Core of Modern Art

In his project “A Reprise,” the photographer remixes Walker Evans’s images of African sculptures—and poses bold questions about what we consider fake or original, art or archive.

“Superfine” Unpacks Self-Expression, Resistance, and Status Through Black Style

Elizabeth Way, Kimberly Jenkins, and Ekow Eshun consider what it means to be a Black dandy—and how the figure functions in diasporic culture and history.

Ike Edeani’s Quest for Sartorial Flair

Roaming Harlem on the cusp of summer, the photographer finds New Yorkers abounding in Sunday-best dazzle.

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Melina Matsoukas Creates Space for Black Stories in Hollywood and Beyond

Solange Knowles interviews the director about her visionary career spanning fashion, photography, music, and film.

Black Style as a Form of Resistance and Joy

For Aperture’s summer issue, “Liberated Threads,” guest editor Tanisha C. Ford explores fashion’s ability to create possibilities for solidarity and selfhood across the African diaspora.

A Portrait of Ming Smith as an Artist in the Making

Smith’s poetic and experimental images are icons of twentieth-century Black life. In an interview, she speaks about her life and career—and the transcendent power of photography.

12 Photobooks That Celebrate Black Voices and History

From Arielle Bobb-Willis’s vividly playful tableaux to Ernest Cole’s incisive photographs of America in the late 1960s, here are essential titles to read this Black history month.

Steven Cuffie’s Tender Portraits of Black Life in Baltimore

For decades, Cuffie’s work has languished in boxes waiting to be discovered. Now, his photographs of Baltimore in the 1970s are finally getting their due.

How Awol Erizku Is Building a Visual Multiverse

In this interview from his Aperture monograph, the artist speaks about his entry into photography and the collective legacies of Blackness.

How Can Synthetic Images Render Blackness?

When the artist Minne Atairu began using AI to make glossy, Afrofuturist images, she discovered a dataset biased toward white women, unveiling the myth of the neutral algorithm.

John McConnico

Confronting the Legacy of Photography’s Anti-Blackness

Kimberly Juanita Brown reveals how the photographic enterprise is haunted by racial violence, finding new ways of looking at the dead and the living.

Laila Stevens Seeks Sisterhood in Her Portraits of Black Women

A visit to North Carolina influenced the photographer’s ideas about the power of family.

In Public Spaces, Tender Photographs about Love and Friendship

Clifford Prince King speaks with Lyle Ashton Harris about displaying sensual images of Black queer men on bus shelters and newsstands.

13 Photobooks that Highlight Black Lives and Artistic Visions

From monographs by Awol Erizku and Deana Lawson, to collections on fashion, community, and power, here are essential titles to read this Black History Month.
Tyler Mitchell, Threads of Memory, 2023

Tyler Mitchell Stages a Homecoming in Georgia

In his latest exhibition, the artist considers the poetics of space, presenting sculptures and photographs that move off the wall.

A Midcentury Portrait of Black Culture in Pittsburgh

For more than fifty years, Charles “Teenie” Harris created a vivid record of the city. Now, a major archival project stands to reveal the scope of his vision.

Remembering the Life and Work of Kwame Brathwaite

Ekow Eshun, Tanisha C. Ford, Tyler Mitchell, and Antwaun Sargent on the visionary photographer whose images and activism helped popularize the slogan “Black Is Beautiful.”

A Celebratory Chronicle of Black College Life

The photographer Adraint Bereal captures the agony and ecstasy of what it is to be a Black college student in the United States.
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Aperture No. 259

Guest edited by Tanisha C. Ford, Liberated Threads explores style and fashion as a language of Black resistance, refusal, and joy. This issue features image-makers who remix and reimagine twentieth-century “soul style,” creating a contemporary dialogue between photographers, filmmakers, and stylists from around the world.

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