‘MY PEOPLE ARE POWERFUL’

WILDEST DREAMS, 2021

During the spring of 2021, it felt like things were looking up.

The sun shined, the days grew longer and more people were getting vaccinated. I felt a sense of optimism after a cold winter. As part of the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Wildest Dreams anthology, we set out to talk with Black Philadelphians about legacy and identity.

In three Philadelphia parks we photographed people with varied experiences and cultural upbringings. We posed the same question to everyone:

What did you learn from your family about your Blackness?

Some had an immediate answer, others had to think about it or have a long and winding conversation. With this portrait series we included a snippet of those conversations, in their own words.

This series was photographed using a Mamiya C330 twin lens reflex camera with Kodak Ektar stock. The images were processed and scanned at Indie Film Lab in Philadelphia