In celebration of Black History Month, HAF editors put together a growing list of Black-founded photography organizations, online magazines, initiatives, resource lists, nonprofits, and exhibition spaces dedicated to amplifying emerging and established voices in photography.
Many of these platforms were launched to counter a chronic representational gap throughout the photographic world. Led by skilled directors, DiversifyPhoto, Authority Collective, and Black Women Photographers, for example, emphasize narrowing – and eliminating – the margins in commercial and editorial photography. Photographer's Greenbook, which launched last June via Instagram, aggregates BIPOC-positive photo platforms that serve as a haven for underrepresented voices in documentary and art photography and includes a range of developing programming to support marginalized photographers.
This list is just a start - we’ll update it periodically. If you’d like to suggest, or you're a founder of a photo-based platform we should include, please send an email to SUBMIT [AT] HAFNY [DOT] ORG. Editor’s clarification note - the criteria for this list is that at least one member of the founding team or collective identifies as Black.
Happy Black History Month. Support Black history, present, and futures every day, all year round, now and forever.
Photographers Greenbook
Founded by artist and educator Jay Simple, Photographers Greenbook aims to fill an ongoing void in the photo community, providing educational tools, resources, opportunities, a scholarship fund, and more to champion and amplify marginalized voices. From their official statement:
“Between 1936 and 1966 the Negro Motorist Green Book was a list of safe places for Black people during their travels throughout segregated USA. The Photographer’s Green Book, in that tradition, is a list of resources to navigate the photographic community which has historically denied the voices of those other than predominantly white cis male artist. It expands on the original Green Book’s target audience, to include the full scope of the BIPOC community as well as the LGBTQI+ community and all of their intersections. It is our belief that the contemporary moment, while influenced by the past, must also include the varying struggles and voices of those living in the 21st century.. Inclusions, Diversity, Equity, and Advocacy(I.D.E.A) are the core principles of The Photographer’s Green Book, which guide the questions we ask, resources we build, and the engagements we partake in within our community.” Read a conversation with founder Jay Simple HERE.
Black Women Photographers
Founded by Polly Irungu, Black Women Photographers is an Instagram page-turned all-encompassing platform and directory dedicated to getting more brands and publishers to seek out, and work with Black women photographers. From their official statement:
“Black Women Photographers aims to disrupt the notion that it is difficult to discover and commission Black creatives. Dedicated to providing a resource for the industry’s gatekeepers.
BWP with your help has grown into a global community and digital database since its first launch in July of 2020 by Polly Irungu, coming from a COVID-19 relief fund (#BWPReliefFund) that raised over $14,000 to provide financial support to Black women and non-binary photographers during the pandemic.
In an effort to promote and encourage inclusive hiring practices, the database highlights any and all Black women who elect to be submitted. Through honest dialogue via social conversations and workshops, the platform seeks to ensure that more Black women are empowered to make the industry as colorful as it ought to be.” Read a conversation with Polly Irungu HERE and follow Black Women Photographers on Instagram.
Photographers Of Color Exhibition Space at the University of Arkansas School of Art
The Center for Photographers of Color
Founded by Aaron Turner, the Center for Photographers of Color is a website, academic and community access center, residency program, archive, digital lab facility, podcast, interview series, resource page, and brick and mortar gallery space out of the University of Arkansas that promotes up-and-coming and under-represented artists of color working within all lens-based media.
From their website:
“Our goal is to collaborate with artists from diverse backgrounds whose work challenges the monolithic historical narratives within culture and art. Through this collaborative approach, the center aims to create a sustainable creative community through the commissioning, support, oral history, and archiving of original works as a public education resource to address identity and representation. The center's programming for the University and community will explore ways of creating positive change and show examples of how to influence and inform thinking and practice in various cultural and social settings. We are dedicated to diversity in art, strengthen the community, region, and state with outreach efforts that are relevant, meaningful, and have a significant impact.
Purpose: To establish an academic and community-access research center, residency program, archive, and digital lab facility to promote emerging and under-represented lens-based artists of color.”
Follow them on Instagram HERE and read a conversation with founder Aaron Turner about his upcoming book HERE.
Black Archivist
Founded by Paul Octavious, Black Archivist “believes in the power of the Black narrative and that Black artists are best suited to tell the stories of our community.” Beyond being a source of constant inspiration on Instagram, the platform provides the tools (cameras!) and resources for Black people to document the manifold triumphs and tribulations of the world and life around them. “We believe access to equipment should not be a barrier to entry for documentation or compensation.” The organization is continuously looking for camera donations - if that’s something you can provide, get in touch with them!
Follow them on Instagram HERE.
Black Archives
Founded in 2015, by Renata Cherlise, Black Archives is a multidimensional platform, printshop, collection of archival materials, and digital experience that spotlights the Black experience in the past, present, and future. “Going beyond the norm, its lens examines the nuance of Black life: alive and ever-vibrant to both the everyday and iconic — providing insight and inspiration to those seeking to understand the legacies that preceded their own.”
Follow them on Instagram HERE.
Kris Graves Projects / Monolith Editions
Kris Graves Projects collaborates with artists to create limited-edition publications and archival prints, focusing on contemporary photography, and works on paper that address issues of race, identity, equity, gender, sexuality, and class.
+KGP was originally founded as a gallery space in DUMBO, Brooklyn. In 2011, +KGP expanded into publishing, recognizing that books and prints have the unique ability to make fine art both accessible and affordable. We strive to expand the reach of artists, cultivate a new cohort of art collectors, and amplify stories that empower the long-forgotten and underrepresented.
Graves recently launched a new imprint, Monolith Editions to recognize the need to “make space for ourselves.” Graves writes: “Artists of color are best positioned to interrogate and speak to the issues that face our country; however, opportunities to share and amplify our work remain elusive. At MONOLITH, we are engaged in the critical work of celebrating, recognizing, and lifting up BIPOC art by publishing artists who have historically been denied opportunities to gain a wider audience for their work.”
Follow +KGP on Instagram HERE.
Diversify Photo
Co-founded by Brent Lewis and Andrea Wise, Diversify Photo is a community and online database of BIPOC and non-western photographers, editors, and visual producers joining forces to “break with the predominantly colonial and patriarchal eye through which history and the mass media has seen and recorded the images of our time.” Their database is frequently used by editors at major media outlets seeking to expand their rosters of photographers. Diversify also produces networking, exhibition, speaking, community-building, and resource-sharing opportunities for their members.
Follow them on Instagram HERE.
Authority Collective
Authority Collective is a team of women and non-binary visual storytellers of color. Through various projects - most famously “The Lit Lit” - an annual list of photographers to watch, Authority Collective aims to push the margins to the center. Here’s a bit of their story from their website:
“In November 2017, a group of womxn and non-binary imagemakers of color — frustrated with racism and inequity in the visual media industry — met in Los Angeles, California, searching for community and solutions.
During this symposium, hosted by the Las Fotos Project space in LA, they asked: Who gets to tell and profit on the stories of marginalized people? Who decides who gets to be an “authority” in the photography industry? How do we establish ourselves as authorities? How do we get gatekeepers to interrogate their practices and push past basic conversations about “diversity”?
We wanted to create actionable solutions for ourselves and industry leaders, to create a culture of accessibility, transparency, accountability. From that, created the Authority Collective — to support each other as we navigate the world of visual media and to challenge harmful narratives perpetuated by inequities in our industry.”
Follow them on Instagram HERE.
Black Is _ Magazine
Founded by Lia Latty in December 2020, Black Is “publishes the stories and the work of Black photographers from around the world, because one experience does not speak for all. We are dedicated to creating a platform to showcase Black photographers whose work speaks to the diversity of our communities and ourselves. The magazine will act as a place of discussion and an archival platform, keeping a database of all the Black photographers we interview/share the work of.”
Follow them on Instagram HERE.
The Black Shutter Podcast
Founded by Idris Talib Solomon and Leslie Ogoe, The Black Shutter Podcast is a series of conversations with Black photographers, filmmakers, editors, and other creative professionals sharing their challenges and inspirations.. Recent highlights include Dee Dwyer, Kris Graves, and Jame Shabazz.
Follow them on Instagram HERE.
Strange Fire Collective
Formed in 2015 by Zora J. Murf, Jess T. Dugan, Hamidah Glasgow, and Rafael Soldi, Strange Fire Collective “is a group of interdisciplinary artists, curators, and writers focused on work that engages with current social and political forces.” Through exhibitions, interviews, publications, events, artist features, and a platform of critical educational resources, SFC is a venue for continual, critical questions on dominant social hierarchies, dedicated to highlighting work made by women, people of color, and queer and trans artists.
Follow them on Instagram HERE.