"Because showing black love through a white gaze is very problematic."

May 27, 2019 12:18 PM

Photographer Miranda Barnes captures the beauty of People of Color in love. I wanted to give this sense of taking back our narrative. I find that when I approach POC subjects and ask to take their photo, they’re like, “Wait, you want to take a photo of me ?” [...] A lot of them have never had a proper portrait taken of them that’s not on an iPhone. Asking to take their photo and validating their existence is, a lot of the time, more important to me than the actual photo. [Vice, Juxtapoz]

More Miranda Barnes:
tumblr
Instagram
flickr
MirandaBarnes.com

posted by nightrecordings (8 comments total)

These are beautiful. This one in particular is just phenomenal.
posted by Fizz at 12:26 PM on May 27, 2019 [3 favorites]

I love her work, especially her use of sunlight. Thank you for sharing!
posted by sallybrown at 12:48 PM on May 27, 2019 [2 favorites]

A lot of them have never had a proper portrait taken of them

It's fascinating and revelatory, this empowering aspect of quality photography. There's a global program with this purpose: "Help-Portrait"
posted by chavenet at 1:01 PM on May 27, 2019 [2 favorites]

From her Tumblr:

How can people continue to support more women of color photographers?

I think it is important to first acknowledge that womxn photographers have been, historically at a disadvantage. This is even more so for Black womxn photographers. However, it’s important to understand the idea behind reclaiming narratives and it’s very exciting to see this slow, but more awareness towards the inequality that has plagued industries for so long. Reclaiming narratives are crucial and I try to view my experiences as a Black woman as an advantage. Support can be as simple as sharing a website, but also buying prints or investing in a photographer.

posted by greermahoney at 1:04 PM on May 27, 2019 [4 favorites]

These are just lovely.

Your pull quote - A lot of them have never had a proper portrait taken of them that’s not on an iPhone. Asking to take their photo and validating their existence is, a lot of the time, more important to me than the actual photo. reminded me of one of the many vivid and memorable passages in The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson:

She made her way to the address she had been given and settled onto the fold-out sofa in the front room of a second cousin she barely knew. Soon afterward, she performed a ritual of arrival that just about every migrant did almost without thinking: she got her picture taken in the New World. It would prove that she had arrived. It was the migrant’s version of a passport.

The picture is sepia, two by three inches, from the forties. Two young women sit on the front steps of a row house on R Street in Washington, looking very Bette Davis. Stacked heels and padded shoulders, wool coats brushing their knees. They are new in town. Childhood friends from Georgia meeting up now in the big city. Their faces give no hint of whatever indignities the South had visited upon them. That was over now. Their faces are all smiles and optimism. The one in the pearls used to greet the train when she was little and dream of going with it. She would become a teacher and, years later, my mother.

Thank you for posting this, nightrecordings. I appreciate the introduction to Miranda Barnes's wonderful work.
posted by kristi at 2:04 PM on May 27, 2019 [7 favorites]

her work is beautiful, thank you for sharing it with us.
posted by poffin boffin at 3:06 PM on May 27, 2019

Great work and I'm a little annoyed with myself that I don't already know about her. Thanks for posting.
posted by octothorpe at 7:13 PM on May 27, 2019

Really Impressive Stuff from Miranda Barnes. TFS
posted by PhotographyAxis at 8:51 AM on June 8, 2019