Herb Robinson, Faces, 1969

Herb Robinson: Embedded in that photograph is my nose and my mouth and my eyes. Now that, I shot in the mirror where it was a self-portrait.

Narrator: Robinson’s day job was in advertising. This photograph is a work of art, but he produced it by adapting the tools that he used for his commercial work.

Herb Robinson: Then what I did is I printed that image, in my dark room, and then put that on top of a glass pane, and it became a shelf because I'm shooting, like I used to shoot a lot of jewelry with a view camera, straight down. Then using mylar materials because still-lifers, they use every material under the sun: fabric, prisms, every type of material and texture you can name as part of the craft of producing work. Here I’m constructing what I wanted to say.

It’s meant not to be so obvious. You have to look, but you’ll see it. I am a strong Black man, and father. So here again is a statement of our culture, our people, using me as a subject.