Annabel Manning - Self of a Former Shadow II 2018-2019

As part of my Lewis Hine Fellowship with Duke University, I worked with the Men’s Empowerment Program (MEP) at Harlem Community Justice Center. MEP creates opportunities for young men of color in Harlem to heal/build self-identity, pursue individual goals, and work with peers to strengthen their communities. My role was to teach these young men artistic tools (printmaking, photography, the written word, photography, audio, and other mediums) as a way to achieve these goals.

MEP participants have all been impacted by the justice system in some way. They constructed collages based on Romare Bearden’s “Block” painting series. Bearden was a Harlem-based artist and activist who created artwork that visualized and commented upon black life in Harlem. Likewise, in the spirit of Bearden, MEP participants created collages based on their own neighborhoods. They took their own photos, collected photos from Harlem-based magazines and newspapers, and they added paint, patterned paper, and text. Then they interviewed each other about their blocks and this audio becsme an important component of the visual pieces. The “Block” pieces were exhibited at the Harlem Community Action Center in East Harlem.

I am also working collaboratively on a series called “a self of my former shadow.” The idea is that the activity of art transforms a person into a self with agency, free from being a mere shadow of their selves. This series includes images from the HCJC MEP group below, but will also extend to works from other projects I have been working on. Art is the representation of this transformation back into a self with agency. The artists below hold up their artworks as representations of their selves to counter how the prison system "sees" and treats them.

"Self as a Former Shadow"

"Block" collages after Bearden

"Self as a Former Shadow"