A Nimble Arc: James Van Der Zee and Photography

James Van Der Zee's work as a Black photographer from the Harlem Renaissance era has been overlooked, but Emilie Boone's book A Nimble Arc highlights his contribution to documenting Black daily life in the US and the African diaspora. Boone argues that Van Der Zee's work challenges the distinction between canonical art photographs and commercial photography, recasting our understanding of photography within the arc of quotidian Black life.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 288 pages
Publication date: 29 September 2023
Publisher: Duke University Press

While James Van Der Zee is widely known and praised for his studio portraits from the Harlem Renaissance era, his extensive and diverse body of work has often been overlooked. From his significant contribution to documenting ordinary people and events in the Harlem community for decades to the inclusion of his photographs in the landmark Harlem on My Mind exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1969, Van Der Zee was a pioneering Black photographer whose work exemplifies the evolving role of photography in shaping Black life. In her book A Nimble Arc, Emilie Boone delves into Van Der Zee's photographic journey throughout the twentieth century, highlighting how his work foregrounded aspects of Black daily life in the United States and the broader African diaspora. Boone argues that Van Der Zee's work straddles the boundaries between art and the vernacular, challenging the distinction between canonical art photographs and the typical output of commercial photography studios. Through Boone's account, our understanding of this celebrated figure and photography within the context of Black daily life is fundamentally reimagined.

Weight: 802g
Dimension: 254 x 178 x 20 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781478024903