Artist Profile

super fly men 42nd street

headstand boy Harlem

Born in Queens NY 1949, I am an African American documentary photographer, short film maker,
and screenwriter for 4 decades now. My works are created from a personal passion,
and never motivated to by income for my dedication and calling as a visual artist.

EDUCATION: International Peoples College in Elsinore Denmark,Christer Stromholm Foto Sholan in Stockholm,Sweden, San Francisco Art Institute - received a scholarship to attend for photography/film making.

TRAVEL:
- Poland as an Independent Study while at the San Francisco Art Institute to document and write about the cultural policies and present life conditions in Warsaw and Cracow in 1977. I won the top award from a competition for images taken in Poland from Poland Panorama magazine and return to Poland to meet the minister of cultural affairs.
- India and Nepal in 1999, photographing the life of border people living on the border of Nepal and India. While in India, I realized many child laborers, ages as young as 9 years, work in all types of employment, and young women working/performing physical duties that men should be doing. I realized these children were part of a still revealing caste system in India. I documented some of my encounters with these youths.

PROFESSIONS: Photographic custom printer for twenty years for photographers and advertising companies. while creating personal photo essays- in his spare time - documenting lifestyles, environments, sub cultures in various countries over the past 40 years on the streets of the world.

In 1985-6 I created a photographic essay on NEW YORK OFF TRACK BETTORS-aka OTB parlors. I documented the patrons of 25 various OTB establishments where horse racing gamblers throughout N.Y.C. and the bouroughs would gather. I was the only photographer to ever document these establishments which were part of a sub culture history in New York. After I completed this 2 plus years of photographing OTB parlors, photography was banned. The images of this essay were never accepted / exhibited in America. They were appreciated and published in Paris in 1987. Subsequently a self published book was made.

Recently, I was asked to direct the play DUTCHMAN by Leroi Jones aka Amiri Baraka, which was performed at the Harlem Repertory Theater in May of 2017 and a documentary, SHADOWS INTHE BOX - which is on 3 platforms presently -, won best documentary in five different countries' film festivals.

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