Collection Online as of September 25, 2023
The police rushed to the supermarket after a call said a hold-up was in progress, and caught a teenager running from the scene. The store manager said they'd caught the wrong person. Later, a police check showed he was suspected of the other crimes
Leonard Freed
(American, 1929–2006)
Vintage gelatin silver print
Image: 16.1 x 23.6 cm (6 5/16 x 9 5/16 in.); Paper: 20.3 x 25.2 cm (8 x 9 15/16 in.)
Gift of George Stephanopoulos 2015.404
© Leonard Freed /Magnum Photos
Location
not on view
Leonard Freed
Born in Brooklyn to Jewish, working-class parents of Eastern European descent, Leonard Freed (1929–2006) went to Europe to become a painter but instead discovered photography. After studying the medium in New York City, he worked as a documentary photographer and photojournalist in Europe. In 1972 he joined Magnum, the celebrated collaborative photo agency. Freed’s photographs in this exhibition are from Black in White America, a series inspired by an experience he had while covering the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961. As he photographed an African American soldier guarding the border, it struck Freed that this man was risking his life to defend a country that limited his own rights. Freed returned to New York to undertake a multiyear exploration of African American life. Freed began shooting around New York, and then traveled extensively throughout the South. He spent time in communities getting to know his subjects, and kept a journal recording his impressions and their stories and words. During these years, he also covered Martin Luther King Jr. and numerous civil rights events, but when Freed published Black in White America in 1968, the book focused instead on the fabric of daily life. As a photojournalist, Freed was an observer rather than a participant, but not an impartial one. He believed that “photography is about who you are. It’s the seeking of truth in relation to yourself.”