A BLACK MAN DELIVERS MAIL TO THE BLOCK OF EAST 43RD STREET ON CHICAGO’S SOUTH SIDE. HE IS ONE OF THE NEARLY 1.2 MILLION PEOPLE OF HIS RACE WHO MAKE UP MORE THAN ONE THIRD OF CHICAGO'S POPULATION. THE PHOTOS ARE PORTRAITS THAT REFLECT PRIDE, LOVE, BEAUTY, HOPE STRUGGLE, JOY, HATE, FRUSTRATION, DISCONTENT, WORSHIP AND FAITH. THEY ARE PORTRAITS OF INDIVIDUAL HUMAN BEINGS WHO ARE PROUD OF THEIR HERITAGE
Featured on PDR in the collection John H. White’s Photographs of Black Chicago for DOCUMERICA (1973–74)
It’s hard not to read John H. White’s DOCUMERICA series as a love letter to Black Chicago. Whether capturing protesters or checkers players, concerts or chores, White’s work feels animated by a wonder and curiosity for the great breadth of stories and characters he encountered while exploring his adopted home city — “life”, as he put it in the captions to several of his images, “in all its seasons”.