Herbert Randall

Untitled (Lower East Side, NY)
c. 1960

A black and white photograph showing a group of children in an urban setting with dilapidated buildings in the background. Some of the children are standing and conversing, while one boy is seated on the ground holding a book with other books scattered around him. The environment appears to be a vacant lot or a street with debris.

A black and white photograph showing a group of children in an urban setting with dilapidated buildings in the background. Some of the children are standing and conversing, while one boy is seated on the ground holding a book with other books scattered around him. The environment appears to be a vacant lot or a street with debris.

Not on view

Date
c. 1960

Classification
Photographs

Medium
Gelatin silver print

Dimensions
Sheet: 10 15/16 × 14in. (27.8 × 35.6 cm) Image: 8 7/8 × 13 1/2in. (22.5 × 34.3 cm)

Accession number
2020.56

Credit line
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase, with funds from the Photography Committee

Rights and reproductions
© Herbert Randall

API
artworks/63071

Audio

Herbert Randall, Untitled (Lower East Side, NY), c. 1960

In Working Together: The Photographers of the Kamoinge Workshop

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Herbert Randall, Untitled (Lower East Side, NY), c. 1960

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Herb Randall: I was interested in this particular street on the lower part of the photograph. Because I had taken a series of photographs on that street.
Narrator: Like the other Kamoinge photographers, Herb Randall thought of his project as being art, not journalism. But often the works involved an element of social commentary anyway.
Herb Randall: And just the devastation from the—they were just tearing this whole area down, and I'm sure to build something “wonderful” in its place. But the children, I don't know where they came from because there was really no place to live, so they must've came from a couple of blocks away or whatever to come to this street.
What I found, I guess, in retrospect is, what the hell are these kids doing...this is their playground? This is education?
I would rather people have a choice. You know, if you want to play in the gutter, then play in the gutter. This is their playground. They had no choice, in a sense. That bothers me. You have to play in crap? No human being needs to do that.

Exhibitions

Working Together: The Photographers of the Kamoinge Workshop

Nov 21, 2020–Mar 28, 2021

Herbert Randall
2 works in the collection

View artist