Deb Willis and Hank Willis Thomas: A mother and son united by love and art
ديبورا ويليس، هانك ويليس توماس: أم وابنها يوحدهما الحب والفن
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
I See Myself In You,"
the symbiotic relationship
through our life and work.
من خلال حياتنا وعملنا.
in my mother's footsteps
it's a way of doing,
and it's a way of seeing.
when they make photographs.
and finding love.
in my family and friends
as a way of telling a story about life,
كوسيلة لرواية قصة عن الحياة،
to become a family in North Philadelphia.
أسرة في شمال فيلادلفيا.
searching for pictures
about black love, black joy
الأسود، الفرح الأسود
the action of love overrules as a verb.
بحدث انتصار الحب كفعل.
if the love of looking is genetic,
ما إذا كان حب النظر وراثي،
since before I can even remember.
after my mother and her mother --
أنه -- بعد أمي ووالدتها --
were my first love.
for calling me a "ham"
to my grandmother's house,
and who are they to me,
when that picture was taken?
before I was born?"
والأسود قبل ما أولد؟
in black and white.
in North Philadelphia,
looking at "Ebony Magazine,"
أنظر إلى "مجلة إيبوني"
that were often not in the daily news,
غير موجودة بالأخبار اليومية،
to be energetic for me,
يكون حيوي بالنسبة لي،
in the Philadelphia Public Library
كتابًا في مكتبة فلادلفيا العامة
by Roy DeCarava and Langston Hughes.
بقلم روي ديكارافا ولانغستون هيوز.
as a seven-year-old,
as a seven-year-old,
عمرها سبع سنوات،
that Roy DeCarava made
التي صنعها روي ديكارافا
that I could tell a story about life.
من خلالها أن أخبر قصص عن الحياة.
that basically changed my life.
الفعل الذي غير حياتي.
told me that every photographer,
أخبرني بأن كل مصور،
trying to answer one question,
الإجابة على سؤال واحد،
see how beautiful we are,
see our community the way I do?"
على رؤية مجتمعنا كما أراه أنا؟
أدرس بكلية الفنون
that I was taking up a good man's space.
بإني آخذ مكان رجل صالح.
of becoming a photographer.
in a class full of male photographers.
مليئة بالمصورين الذكور.
and out of order as a woman,
وغير مقبول مني كامرأة،
that all you could and would do
ما تقدري على القيام به
could have had your seat in this class.
كان بإمكانه أخذ مكانك في هذا الصف.
into that experience.
and I was determined to prove to him
وأنا كنت مصرة أن أثبت له
for a seat in that class.
"Why did I need to prove it to him?"
"لماذا أحتاج أن أثبت له ذلك؟"
and I knew I needed to prove to myself
أعرف أني أريد أن أثبت لنفسي
a difference in photography.
is going to stop me from making images.
يستطيع إيقافي من صنع الصور.
I got pregnant.
أصبحت حبلى.
that he used against me
جنسياً التي استخدمها ضدي
and made photographs daily,
والتقطت الصور يومياً،
as I prepared for graduate school.
الذي كنت أستعد فيه للتخرج من الكلية.
that black photographers were missing
المصوريين السود كانوا مختفين
for ways to tell a story.
"A Choice of Weapons,"
باركس "اختيار الأسلحة"
that I made of my pregnant belly,
الذي عملته لبطني الحامل،
to create a new piece,
taking a place from a good man,"
تأخذ مكان رجل صالح،"
and reversed it and said,
would turn the kitchen into a darkroom.
المطبخ لغرفة تحميض الصور.
just pictures that she took
of and by people that we didn't know,
على الحائط لأناس لم نعرفهم،
of men and women that we knew,
from what I learned in school,
جداً مما تعلمته بالمدرسة،
to figure out what she was up to,
لأكتشف ما الذي تريد أن تصل إليه،
she published this book,
A Bio-Bibliography."
فهرس سير ذاتية."
were making photographs.
من أصول إفريقية يلتقطون الصور.
before the end of slavery,
العبودية بعقدين أو ثلاثة.
of science and technology,
بمقدمة العلوم والتكنولوجيا،
just to make a single photograph.
والكيمياء فقط لعمل صورة واحدة.
to do that if not love?
إن لم يكن الحب؟
"Black Photographers, 1940-1988,"
"المصورون السود، 1940-1988"
and another book, and another book,
وكتاب آخر، وكتاب آخر،
and another book, and another book,
وكتاب آخر، وكتاب آخر،
and another book, and another book,
وكتاب آخر، وكتاب آخر،
and another book, and another.
on every continent,
but all inspired by the curiosity
لكن كلهم مستلهمين من فضول
from North Philadelphia.
black photographers had stories to tell,
السود لهم قصص لإخبارها،
like Augustus Washington,
in the early 1840s and '50s.
black photographers,
about black life during slavery,
حياة السود خلال العبودية،
and telling stories about community.
الجمال وسرد قصص حول المجتمع.
needed to know this story.
يجب أن يعرفوا هذه القصة.
my mother's first student.
puppet strings --
قصد -- سلاسل محرك الدمى --
should make my own pictures
and the now and then.
how I could use photography
outside of the frame of the camera
خارج إطار آلة التصوير
صانع الصورة الفعلي
of the actual image maker
what's being cut out.
as a jumping-off point
أستخدم أبحاثها كنقظة بداية
about how I could use historical images
استخدام الصور التاريخية
for human rights and equal rights
والمساوة في الحقوق
one piece has affected me the most.
فنية واحدة أثرت فيني أكثر.
by Ernest Withers,
التي التقطها إرنست ويثرز
to affirm their humanity.
ليؤكدوا على إنسانيتهم.
that said "I am a man,"
because the phrase I grew up with
أن العبارة التي نشأت معها
it was "I am the man,"
collective statement during segregation
عبارة جامعة خلال الفصل العنصري
after integration.
التي تبدو فردية بعد الإندماج.
in as many ways as I could think of,
النص بأكبر قدر ممكن،
as a timeline of American history,
على أنه خط زمني للتاريخ الأمريكي،
You the man. What a man.
أنت الرجل. يالك من رجل.
in the English language is, "I am."
الإنجليزية هما، "أنا أكون."
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Deborah Willis - Curator, photographerDeborah Willis is a photographer and writer in search of beauty.
Why you should listen
As an author and curator, Deborah Willis's pioneering research has focused on cultural histories envisioning the black body, women and gender. She is a celebrated photographer, acclaimed historian of photography, MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellow, and University Professor and Chair of the Department of Photography & Imaging at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University.
Willis received the NAACP Image Award in 2014 for her co-authored book Envisioning Emancipation: Black Americans and the End of Slavery (with Barbara Krauthamer) and in 2015 for the documentary Through a Lens Darkly, inspired by her book Reflections in Black: A History of Black Photographers 1840 to the Present.
Deborah Willis | Speaker | TED.com
Hank Willis Thomas - Artist
Hank Willis Thomas is a conceptual artist working primarily with themes related to identity, history and popular culture.
Why you should listen
Hank Willis Thomas's work has been exhibited throughout the U.S. and abroad including, the International Center of Photography, Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Musée du quai Branly, and the Cleveland Museum of Art. His work is in numerous public collections including the Museum of Modern Art New York, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Brooklyn Museum, the High Museum of Art and the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC, among others.
Thomas's collaborative projects include Question Bridge: Black Males, In Search Of The Truth (The Truth Booth), and For Freedoms. For Freedoms was recently awarded the 2017 ICP Infinity Award for New Media and Online Platform. Thomas is also the recipient of the 2017 Soros Equality Fellowship and the 2017 AIMIA | AGO Photography Prize. Current exhibitions include Prospect 4: The Lotus in Spite of the Swamp in New Orleans and All Things Being Equal at Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa. In 2017, Thomas also unveiled his permanent public artwork "Love Over Rules" in San Francisco and "All Power to All People" in Opa Locka, Florida. Thomas is a member of the Public Design Commission for the City of New York. He received a BFA in Photography and Africana studies from New York University and an MFA/MA in Photography and Visual Criticism from the California College of Arts. He has also received honorary doctorates from the Maryland Institute of Art and the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts. He lives and works in New York City.
Hank Willis Thomas | Speaker | TED.com