Gordon Parks

Taijuan Moorman

Gordon Parks (1912-2006)

Gordon Parks, best known as the director of “Shaft” as well as work on Life magazine, possessed many talents including photography, music, writing, and directing. Cultural anthropologist and author Lee D. Baker described him as, “one of the most provocative and celebrated photojournalists in the U.S.”

Born in 1912, as you would imagine, Parks didn’t have the best childhood. He went to a segregated elementary and high school, where teachers insisted pursuing higher education would be a “waste of money.” He experienced hate crimes, including one instance when three white boys threw him into a river, already knowing he couldn’t swim. Also during this time, Parks' mother died, eventually leaving him to fend for himself on the streets.

In his mid-twenties Parks was struck by the photography bug. He first started photographing for a women’s clothing store, and later would move from job to job. He specialized in subjects like women’s fashion and Chicago’s black ghettos. 

The racism he encountered in the 1940s, inspired photographic works such as the famous “American Gothic, Washington, D.C.” and other photographs with it's subject. Racism also inspired Parks’ to change jobs when faced with prejudice and discrimination. Despite these attitudes, Parks was hired as a freelance fashion photographer for Vogue, working for them for a few years. He published two books during this time: “Flash Photography” and “Camera Portraits: Techniques and Principles of Documentary Portraiture.”

American Gothic, Washington D.C. Photo from Wikipedia

During the next 20 years, Parks would work for Life magazine, covering everything from fashion to sports, poverty and portraits of important figures of the time, such as Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali. In the 1960s Parks used his own photographs to illustrate his books of poetry and memoirs. He would also write “The Learning Tree” in 1963, “Shannon” in 1981, and various other novels, poetry, autobiographies, filmmaking books, and photographic instruction manuals.

As a director and musician, his various accomplishments include the films: “The Learning Tree,” “Shaft” and its sequel “Shaft’s Big Score,” “The Super Cops” and “Leadbelly” as well as the musical works: “No Love,” “Concerto for Piano and Orchestra,” “Tree Symphony” and “Martin.”

Gordon Parks married and divorced three times, and had four children, and was the godfather to one of Malcolm X’s daughters. He received many awards and honors throughout his career, including “Magazine Photographer of the Year” by the American Society of Magazine Photos in 1941, the NAACP Spingarn Medal in 1972, and the Library of Congress selected “Shaft” for the National Film Registry in 2000.