Red (in checkered shirt) has an argument with Sonny Hollis, his "War Counselor," and slugs it out with him to maintain authority
1948
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
gelatin silver print
Dimensions
image: 33.8 × 26.7 cm (13 5/16 × 10 1/2 in.) sheet: 35.6 × 28.3 cm (14 × 11 1/8 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Corcoran Collection (The Gordon Parks Collection)
Accession Number
2016.117.139
Art Historical Context
In 1948, renowned African American photographer Gordon Parks captured this intense gelatin silver print as part of his groundbreaking Life magazine photo essay, *Harlem Gang Leader*. The image depicts Red Jackson—in his distinctive checkered shirt—clashing physically with his "War Counselor," Sonny Hollis, in a raw moment of internal gang dispute. Red's punch asserts his authority amid the harsh realities of Harlem street life, freezing a pivotal human drama in stark black-and-white. Parks, a pioneering photojournalist and the first Black staff photographer at Life, immersed himself in the wo...
About the Artist
Gordon Parks
Gordon Parks (1912–2006), born the youngest of fifteen children to a Kansas tenant farmer and his wife in segregated Fort Scott, overcame a childhood marked by poverty, racism, and tragedy—including his mother's death at age fourteen—to become one of America's most influential chroniclers of Black life. Entirely self-taught after purchasing his first camera in 1937, inspired by Farm Security Admin...