Jamie Robertson uses her family history to reconcile wider narratives around the African Diaspora in her new book from Fifth Wheel Press, Charting the Afriscape of Leon County.

Robertson pairs images from her childhood and family archive with new landscape photographs and tableaux, and text, often from her family mythos and West African cosmologies, giving her images greater context.

A darkly lit yet highly saturated photograph of domino players, their faces obscured by shadow and a wide-brimmed straw hat on one page, a 1980s family reunion snapshot on the other. Dominos, a constant in her family history, symbolize generational ties, traditions, and holding fast to cultural and family evolutions.

In another pairing, Robertson re-photographs a landscape on her family’s property originally depicted in an image from her family's archive, the new image in conversation with the original on an opposite page. Instead of approaching the two photos as a “then and now” typology, the new photograph takes on a spiritual aspect. The pairing becomes a personal meditation on how we remember a place, and the potential for spirituality to soak into its memory.

Charting the Afriscape of Leon County, Texas highlights and centers the importance and continuity of Black life, spirituality, and its intersection with the land throughout Robertson’s lineage and creative practice.

We recently spoke about Robertson’s work, her family history, and the process of publishing a book during a pandemic. (Humble editor’s note: this book is being printed in a limited 1st edition of 50 copies - if you’re at all considering purchasing one, we highly recommend acting on that consideration soon.)

Jon Feinstein in conversation with Jamie Robertson

Big Daddy’s House in Hopewell, TX, 2019 © Jamie Robertson

Sideview of Big Daddy's House in Hopewell, TX . From Jamie Robertson’s family archive

Jon Feinstein: In the book's description, you say "The story of an axe that becomes a lightning rod and Bibles opened to Psalms 91 in every room, become more than superstitions.. " This hits me so hard. I keep reading and re-reading it.

Jamie Robertson: My family’s oral history is rich with all kinds of rituals and folklore. Living in an intergenerational home, I grew up hearing my grandparents talk about the spiritual and supernatural very matter of factly. It wasn’t until I read Flash of the Spirit and other supplementary texts on Afro-religiosity as an adult, that I made the connection of these stories and behaviors to specific West African cultures. I was curious about these behaviors and their staying power in my family’s collective psyche.

My great-grandmother, Maggie Lee, kept a Bible open to Psalm 91 with a knife across it. That gesture, that practice, is directly tied to Hoodoo (not to be confused with Voodoo). The Holy Bible was an object of power, not just because it’s contents but as an object itself. In this way it functions as a talisman or charm; charms being related to the Bakongo peoples.

My cousin at a family gathering in Centerville in 2019 talked about how her grandmother used an axe as a lightning rod. Being waist deep in research related to African spirituality and philosophy at the time, I immediately thought about the Yoruba Orisha, Shango, and his axe who rules the elements of thunder and lightning. So many African Americans wonder about their connection (or disconnection) to Africa. From what I’ve seen in my family, the traces are still there. As a photographer, I really want to develop a way of seeing the world that is beyond the traditional Western knowledge systems.

Psalm of Protection, 2018 © Jamie Robertson

Feinstein: I'm drawn to your use of the term Afriscape and its reference to diaspora. Can you tell me a bit about your connection/relationship to it and how it relates to your own family experience?

Robertson: The “Afriscape” is a term coined by visual culture scholar Duane Deterville. I came across his writings on the Afriscape in relation to the work of Kahlil Joseph and really identified with what he was saying and adopted it as a framework. The Afriscape in Deterville’s words is…

“... the deterritorialized cultural presence of Black/African people anywhere in the world. The Afriscape is a contiguity of African cultures that acknowledges commonality viewed from varying subjective critical lenses and sensibilities. These Afriscape sensibilities give us the ability to map meaning in these images – gradually unpacking the deceptively simple and oblique narrative to reveal the cosmic scope of their implications.”

I have taken upon myself to connect my family’s behaviors and the landscape back to their source; Africa. It’s all a matter of perspective that takes a lot of unlearning of Western ways of seeing. In my photobook, I end with a photograph of an unknown grave. I spent a lot of time in the colored cemeteries in Centerville and Hopewell looking for traces of African burial practices. You really have to train your eyes to catch them. A lot of African sensibilities are “hiding in plain sight”. Deterville ultimately states that it is our mission as Black creatives to identify these sensibilities and analyze them.

Feinstein: How has this work helped you navigate your family history?

Robertson: It’s allowed me to accept the unknowable aspects of my history. Genealogists often talk about the “1870s Brick Wall” for African Americans. Most research dead ends at the 1870s census. It’s hard to climb over that wall. I resorted to imagining what’s on the other side from the few things that I have slipped through the cracks. This work has also helped me learn that I don’t have to use linear or didactic means to convey a history of a person or place. The book is framed around my great-grandparents and their respective homes. All of the images work together to give a sense of the past and present of their lands and descendants.

Feinstein: I keep coming back to the image of the domino players. Your use of color, shadow, and the way you guide the eye through the image is deeply metaphoric. Can you tell me a bit about the story behind the image?

Robertson: I love that photograph. I was immediately drawn to it when I was reviewing the photographs I had taken that day at my family reunion. I spent the whole reunion working; taking photographs, setting up tables, serving food. It was a long day and the reunion typically starts around 11 am and goes until it gets dark. So I was pretty exhausted by nightfall and wasn’t planning to take any more photos. I just happened to pass by with my camera and took the photo.

Left: Domino game, 1980s. From Jamie Roberton’s family archive. Right: Domino Game, 2018 © Jamie Roberson

Feinstein: Who are the people in the photo?

Robertson: Most of the people in the photograph are my cousins from Dallas. They had all coordinated their clothes; wearing fluorescent yellow. That really worked out nicely composition-wise. My favorite part of the photograph is my cousin’s hand; his tattoo on his hand reads ‘Bro’.

The domino table is busy all day and night. In the book, I paired that photograph with an archival photograph of a domino game at my family reunion from the 1980s. The players change but the game is a constant fixture at reunions.

Feinstein: Like in that photo, that sense of brooding light weaves its way throughout your book. Can you talk a bit about how that fits into your overall conceptualization? I see parallels to the passage of text about your grandmother and thunderstorms...

Robertson: I love moody images. I always have. I am really attracted to the work of Roy DeCarava, Todd Hido, and Kahlil Joseph. I noticed a few years ago a trend in photography that was leaning more towards soft flat lighting; very minimal shadow. It always kind of bothered me because of how it can make darker skin people look ashy or washed out. Shadows are necessary, they hold secrets.

Conceptually, I really like the idea of light and shadow working together in an image to hide and reveal simultaneously. I structured Charting the Afriscape of Leon County, Texas to move from night to day as a way to actively engage Dikenga dia Kongo, or the Kongo Cosmogram. This cosmogram is more than a power symbol, it is active. It is to be performed--to be lived.

One of the most intriguing aspects about it is the concept of the Spirit world being a mirror for the physical world. When it is night in the spirit world, it is day time in the land of the living and vice versa. When shooting at night the landscapes exude an otherworldly presence; the ancestors are present.

View from Big Mama's House, 2017 © Jamie Robertson

Feinstein: This work culminates as your MFA thesis at the University of Houston, in book form, during the COVID crisis, which I can imagine was additionally difficult and illuminating.

Robertson: When I received word from the University of Houston that they were cancelling the MFA Thesis Exhibition, I admit a part of me was a little relieved. I had bitten off a little more than I could chew and had agreed to several other exhibitions in Houston opening around the same time.

Thinking back, it does make me feel sad because there I was about to make my debut into the art world and COVID snatched the rug right from underneath me. I remember my professor called me as she was really hurt about it. At the time, I just wanted to focus on finishing strong and getting my work in the world. The best way I knew to do that was making a book. It was a no brainer as I have always loved book design and I work mostly digitally.

All the images were ready; it was just a matter of editing my final selections. Making this book was an extremely tedious process. There were hundreds of images; enough for at least a volume 2. However, I wouldn’t change what happened. I am really happy with the final product and grateful to Nat Raum at Fifth Wheel Press for believing in this project.

Mommy (and me) and Millicent, 1988 (from the family archive)

Feinstein: Do you see yourself continuing to make work for this series or does the book mark a conclusion?

Robertson: I think of this book as volume 1. There is still so much I want to explore and photograph in Leon County. This volume focuses a lot on Egypt Community in Centerville; a landscape that is literally my second home and my grandfather’s birthplace. I haven’t even begun to photograph in my grandma’s hometown which is just a few miles West in the same county. My overall practice deals with history and the African Diaspora. By continuing to document these Black landscapes, I am adding to the Afriscape.

Feinstein: What do you hope others will glean from this work?

Robertson: At the bare minimum, I hope people get a sense of what the Black presence in Leon County looks like by using my family as a vehicle for exploration. I want people to see these images and to think about how they fit within the realm of what they consider a “Black Landscape.” Ultimately, this book represents the solace my family is provided through holding on to a piece of land that has been in our family for over 100 years.

Feinstein: When not making pictures and working on this book, what are you looking at, reading, watching these days?

Robertson: I just started reading Legacy Russell’s Glitch Feminism. I am really interested in her ideas around people becoming their avatars and the “glitch” as a form of resistance. We spend so much time in the digital space, I think it is interesting to look at how that space holds identity and community.

As for television and film, I’ve been binge-watching a lot of older shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I had never watched the series in its entirety and really have been enjoying watching the character come into her own power throughout the series.

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BIO:
Jamie Robertson is a visual artist and educator from Houston, Texas. She earned a BA in Art and MFA in Studio Art with a concentration in photography and digital media from the University of Houston. In addition, she also holds an MS in Art Therapy from Florida State University. She is a former recipient of the American Art Therapy Association’s ‘Pearlie Roberson Award’ for her joint Frenchtown Mural project. Robertson is also one half of the podcast, Where I See Me, which examines the presence of Black and Brown people in comics and media.

Her creative practice is an autobiographical examination of history and identity in the African Diaspora through the mediums of photography and video. Her work was featured in Where We Are at Art League Houston and Through the Lens: Identity, Representation & Self-Presentation at Florida A & M University Foster-Tanner Fine Arts Gallery. She currently works as Lecturer at Sam Houston State University.

An Autobiographical Photobook on Black Life in Leon County, Texas