James Van Der Zee

James Augustus Van Der Zee was born on the twenty-ninth of June 1886 in Lenox, Massachusetts, the second of six children. His parents, John and Susan Van Der Zee, had served as butler and maid in the New York City household of former President Ulysses S. Grant before settling in Lenox, a small, close-knit Black community in the Berkshires. It was there, at the age of fourteen, that the boy bought his first camera and began photographing his family and his hometown.

Drawn to music as much as to the lens, he moved to Harlem in 1906 with ambitions as a violinist, performing with local ensembles. Photography soon claimed him. After working as a darkroom assistant, in 1916 he opened the Guarantee Photo Studio on West 125th Street, and there he built a portrait practice that would define a movement.

Through the 1920s and 1930s, Van Der Zee made thousands of images of Harlem's rising Black middle class — its weddings and funerals, its clergy, celebrities, athletes, and everyday families. Composing with elegant backdrops, careful retouching, and an eye for glamour, he created the most comprehensive visual record of the Harlem Renaissance, rendering his subjects with dignity and pride.

His fortunes faded with the Depression and the rise of personal cameras, and he slipped into obscurity until the 1969 Metropolitan Museum exhibition "Harlem on My Mind" restored him to acclaim. He worked into his final years and died on the fifteenth of May 1983. James Van Der Zee gave a people the honor of being beautifully seen, and that gift endures.