“Homeward to the Prairie I Come”: Gordon Parks Photographs from the Beach Museum of Art

This exhibition features photographs selected and donated by Parks to Kansas State University in 1973. Becoming a kind of self-portrait, the gift expresses wide-ranging artistic ideas beyond documentary photography. Parks created new narratives and thematic groups from such assignments as Paris fashions, Fort Scott Revisited, and Muhammad Ali to reflect his thoughts on photography as a fine art medium and his work vis à vis celebrated paintings and sculptures. As a result, the gift becomes a kind of self-portrait expressing Parks’ wide-ranging artistic ideas beyond documentary photography. Most significantly, the photographs instigate cultural change by challenging viewers to imagine a more inclusive culture than the one they know: a world where Black skin represents ideal beauty, where an African American athlete embodies the exemplary hero, and where an artist of African heritage has a place within the lineage of excellent artists in Western art history.

Co-curated by Aileen June Wang, Ph.D., Curator, and Sarah Price, Registrar, at the Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, Kansas State University. Tour organized by Art Bridges.

Closed Mondays & University holidays