CHESTER HIGGINS – THE INDELIBLE SPIRIT
2021-05-10“These subjects will not be forgotten; they cannot be erased. They matter.” – Chester Higgins
Chester Higgins walked into the photographic studio of P.H. Polk in Alabama in 1967 to pick up a photograph for an advertisement in his Tuskegee University newspaper. He left with something entirely unexpected–the first awareness of a passion that would unfold throughout his life. Higgins caught a glimpse that day of photographs hanging behind Polk’s studio curtains that he had taken during the 1930s of people in the rural South. The beauty, dignity and strength of character in those photographs captivated Higgins, and reminded him of the people he knew and had seen in his church and among farmers in rural Alabama where he grew up. The power of Polk’s images inspired Higgins to ask the elder photographer several days later if he would teach him to use Polk’s own camera. Surprised by the naïve and audacious request, Polk lent Higgins his camera for a few hours. This extraordinary gesture of generosity and the valuable information and insights he subsequently gave Higgins, started the young man on a long and extraordinary journey with photography.
Opposite – Early morning coffee, Harlem, 1974
Exhibition runs through to June 26th, 2021
Bruce Silverstein Gallery
529 West 20th Street
New York
NY 10011
