James Van Der Zee, 1980
Photo by A. Bambuzza
James Van Der Zee, African-American photographer of the Harlem renaissance who helped complete a picture of six decades of black life in America, was born on 136 years ago today.
At Guarantee Photo Studio, he took pictures of many of Harlem’s luminaries in the 1920s and ’30s. They included Countee Cullen, Bill (Bojangles) Robinson, Adam Clayton Powell Sr., and his son, Adam Clayton Powell Jr.
Van Der Zee was also well known for his funeral portraits, some of which were gathered in a 1978 book, The Harlem Book of the Dead.
Despite Van Der Zee’s local acclaim, his work was not widely recognized until 1969, when the Metropolitan Museum of Art showed a retrospective of his work, “Harlem on My Mind.” Of his photographs, he once said, “I tried to pose each person in such a way as to tell a story.”
Van Der Zee died in 1983.
Miles Davis
Photo by James Van Der Zee
Dancing Girls, Harlem, 1928
Photo by James Van Der Zee
Nude in front of fireplace, Harlem, circa 1930
Photo by James Van Der Zee