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PAST EXHIBITIONS

 

Old Oakland, 1997

Old Oakland, 1997

By drawing us into the details of his observations Watts often presents small mysteries that force us to look for a larger meaning outside of each individual image. There are many journeys contained in his photographs, and if we pay close attention it seems that each image can move us through a continuous cycle of memory, ritual, and renewal.

 


Text and images are excerpts from Contact Sheet 101, Lewis Watts: South to West Oakland. This and other publications can be purchased from the Light Work store.

LEWIS WATTS

SOUTH TO WEST OAKLAND

April 5 - June 30, 1999
Contact Sheet 101


The photographs that Lewis Watts made in southern parts of the United States and in West Oakland, California are engaging for what they contain and for what they are missing. His intent to record and describe the impact and evidence of African Americans in and on the places they inhabit, led him to African-style graves in South Carolina, aged and faded murals on Beale Street in Memphis, and to a busy barber shop in West Oakland, California.

There is a timeless quality to many of Lewis Watts' photographs as they seem caught somewhere in a cycle of history. Some look like he was peering over the shoulder or around the corner from Walker Evans, others recall Robert Frank, Dorothea Lange, and Roy DeCarava, and others perhaps even Clarence John Laughlin. But within the tradition of documentary photography Watts has decided to concentrate on the details that define the meaning of journey and the signposts that survive after the parade has gone by.

 

West Oakland,1993

West Oakland, 1993


Major exhibitions at Light Work are published in Contact Sheet. Exclusively from Light Work, this publication is available by subscription only.