Vol. 8 Presenter: Rich Frishman
Presenting
Ghosts of Segregation
Summary
Ghosts of Segregation photographically explores the vestiges of America’s racism as seen in the vernacular landscape, often hidden in plain sight behind a veil of banality. Segregation is as much current events as it is history. Past is prologue. Fueled by fear and intolerance, these demons haunt us because they are so very much alive. The project seeks to preserve the evidence of our nation's original sin. When these telling traces are erased, the lessons they contain are lost. All human landscape has cultural meaning. Because we rarely consider our constructions as evidence of our priorities, beliefs and desires, the testimony our landscape tells is perhaps more honest than anything we might intentionally present. Our built environment is society’s autobiography writ large. The truth is that our society and our nation were never built upon the notion that all men are created equal. Rather, they have been built upon a foundation of inequality. While the Old South depended upon the labor of human beings considered chattel, the North was built by the blood, sweat and tears of those indentured by other means; economically, politically, ethnically and racially. Slavery has left a permanent stain upon our nation’s soul.
Bio
Richard Frishman’s photography is included in a wide range of private and institutional collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Photography, the Amon Carter Museum, and the OAS Art Museum of the Americas. His work has garnered dozens of prestigious awards, including the 2019 Review Santa Fe Curator's Choice Award (juror: Makeda Best), the 2019 PhotoNOLA Portfolio Review Award, two Sony World Photography Awards (2018), Communication Arts Photography Award (2018), Photo District News Photo Annual (2018), and has been a finalist in Photolucida’s Critical Mass competition three times. He was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize (1983) in feature photography for "Critical Caring," an in-depth look at the struggle to survive traumatic burn injuries.