Introduction

Narrator: Welcome to Working Together: The Photographers of the Kamoinge Workshop. The Kamoinge Workshop was a group of Black artists based in New York who came together in 1963 in the spirit of friendship and exchange. Each member was dedicated to the idea of photography as an art form. The exhibition focuses on the first two decades of the collective and features the work of fourteen artists, who joined the Workshop in its formative years and consistently remained central to the group and its dialogue. This audio guide includes the voices of the nine artists who are still with us today, as well as one family member. 

The Kamoinge Workshop shared a commitment to portray aspects of Black American life that the mainstream media ignored, and a desire to create exhibition and publication opportunities for Black photographers. But as you’ll hear in the interviews that follow, they took a richly varied range of approaches to their material and their art. Please enjoy the exhibition.