Gordon Parks: We Shall Not Be Moved

Alison Jacques, in partnership with The Gordon Parks Foundation and on the occasion of the Foundation’s 20th Anniversary, presents Gordon Parks: We Shall Not Be Moved, a solo exhibition by pioneering American artist Gordon Parks (b.1912, Fort Scott, US; d.2006, New York), curated by renowned social justice activist, Attorney Bryan Stevenson (b.1959, Delaware), founder and Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama.

The exhibition title references the protest anthem, We Shall Not Be Moved, evolving from the African American spiritual song I Shall Not Be Moved, which signifies unwavering resolve, and has become a cultural touchstone for movements seeking justice. The exhibition presents a timely parallel between Parks’ photographs and the current crisis in America. Stevenson articulates how we are living in a moment when there is an intense and active effort of erasure, retreat from civil rights and silencing of Black voices and history in the United States, and goes on to say how Parks’ images provide insight and relevance to our current discourse. His work absolutely suggests resistance to bigotry and oppression.

Parks is one of the most groundbreaking figures in twentieth century photography. Born into poverty and segregation, he had no professional training and was self- taught. In 1937, aged 25, Parks purchased a Voigtländer Brillant camera from a Pawn shop in Seattle for less than $12. He was first inspired by photographs of migrant workers which he saw in a magazine, and famously referred to his camera as a weapon against poverty and social wrongs.

Stevenson’s curation includes some of Parks’ most well known works, including American Gothic, Washington, D.C. (1942) and photographs of the 1963 March on Washington, including his portrait of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. making his canonical speech I Have a Dream. The show includes iconic works Outside Looking In, Department Store and Mr and Mrs Albert Thornton, from Parks’ Segregation in the South series, commissioned by Life Magazine published under the title ‘The Restraints: Open and Hidden’ (1956). Hired in 1948, Parks broke racial barriers
as the first Black staff member of America’s leading photo magazine. Unusually for a photographer, Parks often wrote his own articles, allowing him to inject his personal perspective and challenge stereotypes. His Segregation in the South series humanised the effects of Jim Crow segregation by following the daily lives of Black families in Alabama, creating narratives that consistently expressed the dignity and complex humanity of his subjects, starkly contrasting with mainstream representations.

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