Jamal Shabazz
For our asynchronous class I decided to watch the film on street photographer Jamal Shabazz. Upon watching the film I learned how relatable and down to Earth Jamal was. In terms of his creative process which was somewhat like my current process. That being no real process at all. It was mentioned that he went out on the streets with no real plan of what he was going to shoot or where he was going to shoot. This to me is where people get to express themselves fully as they tend to capture what captivates them in the moment. What captivated Jamal and inspired him to shoot included people with a unique fashion sense and those to road public transportation (specifically the trains). He felt capturing the image of these people who were thought of as lower class was important. One of his favorite spots was a train he used to take as a child. Another huge to him was MalcomX. He used MalcomXs message and ideology for himself. He would go into “bad’ parts of town to take photos in order to show how similar life was beyond these points. Jamal left quite the imprint on the black community. The film talks to many other artists to claim how inspirational Jamals work was. They talk about how his way of capturing life helped guide them in their own journeys. Jamal did such a good job getting comfortable with his subjects that others tried to emulate it. Jamal would approach groups who had obvious leaders and did what he could to make said leader feel comfortable around him. This would give Jamal the chance to capture who these people really were without them being on edge or concerned the entire time. Jamal Shabazzs’ work will definitely be a part of my archive as his method and work has really caught my eye and is something I would love to look more into.