Street Scene, San Francisco
c. 1969
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
chromogenic print
Dimensions
image: 66.7 × 98.7 cm (26 1/4 × 38 7/8 in.) sheet: 76.2 × 101.6 cm (30 × 40 in.)
Classification
Photograph
Department
CPH
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Corcoran Collection (The Gordon Parks Collection)
Accession Number
2016.117.268
Art Historical Context
In the vibrant "Street Scene, San Francisco" (c. 1969), Gordon Parks captures the pulse of urban life on the West Coast during a transformative era. A pioneering African American photographer, filmmaker, and photojournalist, Parks worked for *Life* magazine and documented the struggles and resilience of Black Americans amid the Civil Rights Movement. This large-scale chromogenic print—measuring nearly 27 by 39 inches—showcases his mastery in color photography, a medium then gaining prominence in fine art for its ability to convey emotional depth and beyond black-and-white traditions. Parks' s...
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...