Poor People’e Campaign: A National Call for a Moral Revival is a project that uses documentary photographs that I shot as an official photographer for the Poor People’s Campaign during the 40 days of Action that took place in 38 state capitals in the summer of 2018. It is the revival of the original Poor People’e Campaign that took place in 1968 that was started by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King.

The project consists of a series triptychs and qaudriptychs where there is a photo of a protest shot in a journalistic style, a studio portrait of a key leader/organizer from the journalistic photo and a third panel which is a monitor consisting of a time-based portrait of the same leader/organizer speaking about the aesthetics of the journalistic photo of the taken of the Poor Peoples Campaign Action in Albany, NY.

The design of the custom made wooden frames which hold the series are inspired by the aesthetics of Shaker communities of North America. I am choosing Shaker craftsmanship because of the progressive politics of the Shaker communities of America in the 19th century. Their theology believed in a dualistic God comprised of Man and Women. Their politics in regards to women and African-Americans were very progressive and their innovation in furniture making were an aesthetic representation of pious devotion to the Divine through well built and pragmatic works of craftsmanship. The excellent wood work of Shaker society will give a very American feel to the Triptychs which will be metaphorically and literally “framing” progressive spiritual political movements in the history of American aesthetics and social movements like abolitionism and civil rights.