Announcement from Meyers Gallery: https://daap.uc.edu/research-work/galleries/meyers
In a time where wealth inequity in the United States has reached a point only matched by the period leading up to the Great Depression, calls for systemic change can be heard across the political spectrum. With a sense that the powers that be prosper under the status quo, the poor remain poor and the middle-class live in stagnation and decline. In this trying time, the voices of the marginalized attempt to shout over the voices of the powerful and the media in order to be heard.
Under the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Poor People’s Campaign sought to bring light to the issues of the poor and to hold those in power accountable. The photographs in this exhibit document the living conditions of the poor alongside images of the 1968 Poor People’s Campaign March that demanded change and the adoption of an Economic Bill of Rights in the wake of King’s assassination.
This exhibition reflects on the current state of economic affairs by considering the human impact of these problems—honoring those who have raised their voices in an attempt to remedy issues that still plague us today. Born into Cincinnati’s impoverished West End, featured photographer and educator Major Morris would later graduate from Harvard to dedicate his career—from behind both lens and desk—to further the call of the marginalized. These documents of the past remain as relevant today as the era in which they were captured.
Sponsor: Fotofocus
