GORDON PARKS - The Best $12.50 Ever Spent
Oyiza Adaba | AFRICA-RELATED NEW YORK
Photo credit: Screenshot from Moments Without Proper Names
“I’ve chosen my camera as a tool of social consciousness.”
To celebrate Black History Month, we remember Gordon Parks.
In his final 1986 film titled Moments Without Proper Names, multi-talented director Gordon Parks turned the camera on himself, delivering decades of work as a photographer, journalist, poet, composer and social icon.
The best $12.50 he would ever spend was on a camera purchased in a pawn shop in Seattle. He never looked back and would go on to document and showcase America and the rest of the world through decades of change and evolution. Through his lens, Parks tells the Black story, the African-American story, the Human story. His camera took him around the world, and opened doors to places most black people could only dream of accessing. He composed many music scores, including the motion picture 'Shaft' and spearheaded the Blaxploitation movement in the 70s.
Parks' penetrating gaze was just as intense as his haunting images, which were backed by the potency of his carefully-crafted words and smooth baritone. He humanized every story.
Gordon Parks was born the last of 15 children in Kansas in 1912. His passing in 2006 at the age of 93, left behind an unrivaled legacy in documenting poignant global historical 'moments without proper names'.
'The Learning Tree' was the Memoir he finally wrote in 1963. With the full backing of a major motion picture studio - another rarity in his time - he scored, produced and directed the film adaptation in 1969. He took this as a 'responsibility' to set a precedent for black filmmakers.
Photo credit: Screenshot from Moments Without Proper Names
In his words, "I've chosen my camera as a tool of social consciousness. Common sense told me I had to have insufficient understanding of what was right or wrong. Otherwise, my camera eventually became my own enemy. I tried to keep my own consciousness alert, at the highest level of integrity, those things I gave myself to. It was clearly defined from the very beginning that it'd be hard not to betray myself, to remain faithful to my emotions when facing the controversial issues of black and white. I was a journalist first. I would have to remain aware that being true to my own beliefs counted even more. I would have to bear the anguish of objectivity and trying to avoid those intellectual biases and subjectivity can impose on a reporter. I was a journalist, and expected to fulfill the commitment as all journalists are supposed to have emotional detachment. Succeeding years would test my ability to retain that detachment".
Listen to Gordon Parks Reading of The Learning Tree