Legendary photographer Stephen Shames on having a traveller rather than tourist mindset
In the 1960s, American photographer Stephen Shames befriended and photographed activists and revolutionaries such as Martin Luther King and the Black Panthers.
In the following years his photographs covered everything from civil war in Lebanon to the Troubles in Northern Ireland, from photographing street kids to child soldiers, and much more. To gain the trust required to photograph such subjects needs a lot of patience and tact.
While the average holidaymaker will most likely not be taking photographs requiring such a high degree of sensitivity, adopting Shames’ mindset will certainly be rewarded with better travel photographs.
“I guess it's just a matter of your attitude,” he tells me on the eve of his new exhibition, Black Panthers & Revolution: The Art of Stephen Shames at the Amar Gallery in Fitzrovia, London.
“There's this idea of travellers versus tourists. So if you're going go to Asia, for example, you can go as a tourist and order hamburgers and want everything like it is back home, and look down on the people, and say it's dirty. A lot of people travel, and I don't even know why they do it because they don't really want to. They might as well stay at home.
“Or instead you can be what I'm calling, or other people have called, a traveller, where you really make an attempt to understand where you're going.
“In my case I read a lot, I listen to the music. I try and just get into the vibe or the mood of the people that I'm photographing. It's impossible to know what anybody else is actually really thinking, but obviously you can kind of get into the vibe and, and get close to it and become part of the community. And, and a big part of that is to actually be open and to listen and to try and learn from people. And I think when you meet other people, if they feel that you're open and you're really trying to learn, they're open to you. I think it comes down to your attitude and how you approach people.”
Much honoured and awarded over the years, Shames’ images are in the permanent collections of 42 international museums and collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, the International Center of Photography, and the Museum of Modern Art all in New York, and the National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC.
This new London exhibition is the first London gallery show for Shames, whose archive of Panther images is the largest in the world. For the first time in London, his powerful civil rights images of Martin Luther King Jr, Bobby Seale, Huey Newton, Maya Angelou and Angela Davis are on view at the gallery. Most of the images in this exhibition are being displayed for the first time in Europe, and many have never been on display before at all.
At a time when racism is on the rise, hopefully this exhibition serves as a reminder that equality has been a struggle for millions often suppressed due to race, gender or sexuality.
Black Panthers & Revolution: The Art of Stephen Shames runs until 6 July at the Amar Gallery, London