Existence and Experience: Reflecting on Ming Smith’s Photography

Although the Harlem of the 1970s was marked by violence, crime, and loss, in stark contrast to that of the Harlem Renaissance, it was still a site of resilience, community, and creativity. As a result of the rise in crime, drug addiction, among other social problems, many Harlemites who had the means moved out during this period. Still, those that stayed worked to revitalize the city and contributed to the continued cultural output of their community. Among those creatives was photographer Ming Smith, who arrived in Harlem in 1972 and was immediately inspired by street life, cultural ferment, and musical heritage. Before moving to Harlem, she was an undergraduate pre-med biology student at Howard University. While her father was an amateur photographer and taught her how to use a camera, she didn’t begin to pursue photography until she took a photography class while at Howard. Her professor, however, told her that because of her race and gender, she would most likely never be able to make a career out of being a photographer. 

Shortly after arriving in Manhattan, she joined the Kamoinge Workshop, a Black photography collective, and became their first female member. During her time with the collective, she began to evolve as a photographer through peer-to-peer discourse, critiques, and exhibitions. The collective provided a generative space that allowed Smith to address the political and cultural landscape of the time and use her photographs as a form of political activity. She would go on to exhibit her work in three Kamoinge group shows in New York and Guyana. 

In 1972, Smith decided to drop off her portfolio at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) when the photography department put out an open call for new work but was initially dismissed as the receptionist assumed that she was a courier. She ultimately was able to leave her portfolio and, a few days later, received a call from the department’s chief curator, Susan Kismaric. The offer she made to purchase two photographs greatly undervalued Smith’s work, and she initially declined it. Upon re-evaluating, she took the offer and became the first Black woman photographer to have work in MoMA’s collection. The reasoning for the lowball offer extended to Smith for her two photographs isn’t explicit, but the event mirrors how artistic outputs by Black creatives haven’t historically been viewed as valuable. 

Writing for ArtNet, Julia Halperin and Charlotte Burns discuss how the popularity and hypervisibility of Black American artists like Jean-Michel Basquiat, whose painting Untitled (1982) sold for $110.5 million in 2017 by Sotheby’s, gives the impression that work by Black American artists is as valued as that of other creatives. They write that just 2.7% of all acquisitions and 7.6% of all exhibitions at 30 prominent museums have been works by Black American artists. Stating that this progress is recent, it’s evident that having her work in an institution like MoMA wasn’t just radical for the time; art by Black Americans continues to be kept out. 

That Smith almost didn’t have the opportunity to have her work considered by MoMA is not only a reflection of the exclusion of Black American artists within the art world but also calls attention to how crucial it is to have representation of diverse artists within educational and cultural institutions like museums. Smith’s work challenges the perpetuation of a dominant, prejudiced perspective, one that leads to one-dimensional portrayals of Black Americans. She dismantles this one-dimensionality with the use of a blur technique that she is well-known for. By blurring figures, she is referencing the continued attempt to efface the nuances within the experiences of Black Americans. The method also highlights Black Americans' simultaneous absence and hypervisibility within society. They exist but are often viewed in an amorphous way.

Ming Smith, African Burial Ground, Sacred Space, from ‘Invisible Man’, 1991. Image Credit: Ming Smith

While Smith’s work is heavily inspired by and concerned with the portrayal of life in cities throughout the United States, like Philadelphia, her work evokes and is reminiscent of a New York City existence, with shots documenting sites like the Apollo Theater Marquee and Alvin Ailey’s 1989 funeral at The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. Smith’s connection to New York City is most notably present in her images of jazz musicians and references to and influence of jazz music. Smith curated a playlist of blues and jazz songs for her exhibition at MoMA, including Pharaoh Sanders’ “The Creator Has a Master Plan,” several pieces from Alice Coltrane’s Reflection on Creation and Space, and John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme. 

Music greatly informs Smith’s work and the emotional response she would like people to have upon engaging with her work, saying, “If people could feel what I feel when I hear a Billie Holiday song–that’s what I would want them to feel when they look at my work.” Echoes of blues and jazz, which originated out of Black American culture in the 19th and 20th centuries during political and societal change, are evident in her photographs of musicians like Sun Ra and Grace Jones. Beyond that, though, her images echo the sentimentality that blues and jazz musicians express in their songs, reference to a traumatic and violent history, and advocate for civil rights in the present. 

In her new exhibition, Projects: Ming Smith at MoMA, in collaboration with The Studio Museum and Harlem and MoMA Ps1, the influence of these musical genres is further taken up by her documentary and improvisation style of photography. This technique is closely related to how Smith captures brief moments of Black existence, fleeting moments of jubilation that must be captured instantly so as not to forget them. It is a form of Black memory practice that builds an archive, working to fill in gaps in history and construct a future that continues to honor and celebrate Black culture.