American Gothic, Washington, D.C., Gordon Parks

“…how do I live free in this black body? It is a profound question because America understands itself as God’s handiwork, but the black body is the clearest evidence that America is the work of men.” ("Between the World and Me," p. 12)

Before he began his influential career in photojournalism at Life magazine in 1948, Kansas native and African-American photographer Gordon Parks worked for the Farm Security Administation (FSA), the government agency created to document the effects of the Depression. American Gothic was taken while Parks was employed by the FSA in Washington, D.C. This portrait of Ella Watson, a cleaning woman at the FSA offices, is Parks's most famous photograph. Although he is best known for his work as a photographer, Parks was also an author, director, poet, filmmaker, composer, and painter.

Exhibition Label: "Art for Kansas: Building the Collection, 1988-1998 (Recent Acquisitions)," Nov-1998, John Pultz and Susan Earle At their 1993 Annual Meeting, the Friends of the Art Museum voted to buy a photograph by Gordon Parks, a Kansas native and an African-American photographer. The meeting coincided with Parks's visit to the University and an exhibition of his work from the Edwin A. Ulrich Museum of Art at Wichita State University. So much interest resulted in Parks's photographs, the Friends raised funds to buy nine additional works. Before he began his influential career in photojournalism at "Life" in 1948, Parks worked for the Farm Security Administation, the government agency created to document the effects of the Depression. "American Gothic" was taken while Parks was employed by the FSA in Washington, D.C. This portrait of Ella Watson, a cleaning woman at the FSA offices, is Parks's most famous photograph. Although he is best known for his work as a photographer, Parks is also an author, director, poet, filmmaker, composer, and painter. Archive Label: Gordon Parks has enjoyed a long and successful career as an artist, working in poetry, fiction, autobiography, film, and ballet as well as in the medium for which he is best known, photography. During the 1940s he made photographs for the Farm Security Administration and the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, projects that documented American life during that time. He joined the staff of Life magazine in 1949 as its first African-American photographer, working in France, the United States, and Brazil. He retired from Life in the early 1970s and now makes film, writes, paints, and composes music, in addition to his photography.