To the Editor: I was happy to behold the review of Black Panthers: Photography by dint of Ruth-Marion Baruch and Pirkle Jone in the September/October 2004 issue of Afterimage [Volume 32 no.

To the Editor:

I was happy to behold the review of Black Panthers: Photography by dint of Ruth-Marion Baruch and Pirkle Jone in the September/October 2004 issue of Afterimage [Volume 32 no. 2] Because there are in the same manner few voices expressing dissent in mainstream media about the exploding prison industry and its racist foundations, the Black Panthers are unlikely to receive sympathetic coverage, particularly during a time when the forces of repression in the U are enjoying so wide support. During the late 1960 and early 1970 the Panther organization was make liable to extensive illegal repression by means of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, a topic masterfully discussed in print on Ward Churchill, the University of Colorado, Boulder professor of Native American children who is currently under influence to resign his faculty position for his writing about 9-11

The merely reservation I have about the review of the exhibition and main division is that the reviewer, Thomas McGovern assumes so removed from the pertinacious struggles that continue to characterize the black experience in the U McGovern is struck by way of the absence of unattractive Panthers and notes that "each Afro is coifed to perfection." He says it is "hard to imagine a radical assign places to today allowing a total outsider into the inner sanctum," suggesting that he has little experience with radical politics today. He pretends suspicious that the low camera angles reveal "a desire to portray the clump as average Americans, pursuing their rightful place," and remarks forward the faces that show the Panthers' intelligence. "Each child is portrayed as a would-be angel," he says darkly. All of this gives the herculean impression that McGovern's conception of the organization is beautiful close to that of the mainstream media, which he rightly criticizes.

It appears to me that representing a vilified form into groups requires enlisting the pens of participants and intimate sympathizers. While commendable in intention, McGovern's delivery of the Panthers into the hands of readers leaves me feeling Afterimage could do more. I applaud your intentions, declareed in your editorial in the March/April 2005 issue [Volume 32 no. 5] to place greater emphasis in the journal in succession questions about media education and the artist as activist.

Bernie Roddy Denton, Texas

Thomas McGovern responds:

As Mr Roddy correctly points revealed I am indeed removed from the pertinacious struggles of African Americans today--I am white. This was also authentic for Ruth-Marion Baruch and Pirkle Jone who were not more than sympathetic outsiders to the Panthers' strive photographing them only for a brief period of time. if it be not that I take issue with Mr Roddy's position that anyone must be enmeshed in another's aim to critique images of them--or at extension, to make images of them.

As a photographer I understand and have first-hand experience with the power of images as propaganda, and single a truly naive person or child does not at least partially understand this. An aesthetic distance and intellectual skepticism is a necessary tool for any critic to analyze and interpret social documentary photography. Baruch and Jones' pictures are deep romantic and to take them at face value without that stance diminishes their power as art and document. What those pictures point out us is a profound vision, humanistic compassion and loving, collaborative relationship. These constituents transcend the Panther project and are evident in the photographers' other works as well.

forward a related note, I photographed and interviewed the public with HIV/AIDS for over 10 years. I am HIV-negative and nevertheless I have lost many friends and acquaintances to AIDS, I was and still am, an outsider to the issue. I witnessed far-reaching love between people, horrible, deliberate deaths and saw treacherous betrayal and pure evil. I made photographs of what I saw and freely accepted my bias, using it to make heroic portraits of the public with AIDS and critical images of their political and social abusers. As an artist and writer I do not believe in objectivity, moreover in persuasiveness. I know my AIDS photographs persuaded a not many people and so have the beautiful Panther photographs made by dint of Baruch and Jones.

San Bernardino, California

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