We have witnessed numerous compelling films focusing on visual artists: Vivian Maier. Maybe the film medium truly excels when showcasing exceptionally powerful photographs. Now we have one more remarkable case, directed by filmmaker Yemi Bamiro, chronicling the impressive career of Kwame Brathwaite—a creative force, musician and social justice champion who represented a distinct politico-aesthetic perspective.
Together with his family member Elombe, he effectively created the slogan “Black Is Beautiful” throughout the sixties by capturing the African American women in Harlem: youthful women of color who became the transformative archetype for aesthetics, rejecting conventional grooming practices and the predominant white model of womanhood.
The Impact of a Simple Phrase
Black Is Beautiful evolved into a powerful unifying message, an visionary concise manifesto for change. Just to assert that black people radiated beauty emerged as a liberating power in society, politics and creative expression. The artist emerged as integral to the civil rights African diaspora cause by photographing the legendary boxer leading up to his historic Rumble in the Jungle in the seventies.
He served as the official visual documentarian for the Jackson 5's international performances, and eventually was named the resident artist for the legendary Apollo theatre, assembling an amazing archive of musical pioneers. Together with his brother, he was the central figure behind securing the anti-apartheid icon to address the public in the community.
Personal Journey
The photographer's offspring the younger Brathwaite recounts the their mission to achieve due acknowledgment for his parent's achievements after he was hurtfully overlooked in Washington DC's Smithsonian institution, opened by the political leader in this century.
The film further reveals the profoundly sorrowful origin of the photographer's dedication to photography: the disturbing pictures of the lynching martyr, the adolescent civil rights lynching victim whose grieving mother defiantly requested an open coffin so the brutal truth of racial hatred would not be covered up.
From Tragedy to Hope
In this representation of horror, the visionary found a kind of transformative realization that led him toward visual representations of beauty. His photographs were eloquent of community pride and typically subtle in messaging: he established a fresh symbolic representation of pride upon which social causes could unite.
This represents an captivating chronicle of artistic vision that persists in empower decades later.
