Gordon Parks: Camera Portraits from the Corcoran Collection
at National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.
13 July 2024 – 12 January 2025
‘Gordon Parks: Camera Portraits from the Corcoran Collection’, a solo exhibition of Park’s portraits, is on view at National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C from 13 July 2024 – 12 January 2025.
The exhibition explores Park’s merging of the methods of both documentary and studio photography, blending a desire to place subjects where they live and work with a particular attention to dress, character, and expression. In doing so, he believed he could create portraits of individuals that addressed their cultural significance. Parks applied this approach to such American icons as boxer Muhammad Ali, revolutionary leader Malcolm X, and conductor Leonard Bernstein, as well as to a Harlem gang leader and to a Detroit couple, revealing the humanity and cultural dignity of each person. This exhibition presents 25 portraits Parks made between 1941 and 1970.