For photographer Shawn Walker, life is not black and white but a symphony of textures and tones, layered like the rhythms, harmonies, and melodies of his hometown. Born in Harlem in 1940, Walker got his start accompanying his uncle, Herbert Hoover, a bar photographer who became one of the first in the neighbourhood to get a Polaroid. By the late ’50s, he was hanging out in storied jazz clubs like Minton’s Playhouse and Birdland, while practicing his own instrument: the camera.
Watching his uncle’s thriving side hustle, Walker intuitively understood he could make photographs without having to rely on it as his livelihood. He joined a local photography group that merged with another in 1963 to become Kamoinge, today the oldest nonprofit photography collective in the world. Walker, the youngest founding member, was joined by luminaries including Roy DeCarava, Adger Cowans, Anthony Barboza, and later Ming Smith and Frank Stewart.
It was here, in Kamoinge members’ homes during their spirited Sunday sessions, that Walker learned photography was not just a trade, it was an art. There were no rules, other than he could write his own, and so he did, devoting a lifetime to elevating photography to the realm of fine art.In 2019, Walker became the first Black photographer to have his archive acquired by the Library of Congress, his collection of over 100,000 images housed alongside luminaries including Toni Morrison, James Baldwin, and Maya Angelou – all of whom he has photographed during his storied seven-decade career.
