Throughout my work in collage and scouring the web for art that means something to me, I have found thousands of images of unidentified Black people, photos of Black women, children, men, and their families, all with unknown origins. The archives shows their blank faces that stare at the camera, remaining still because the slightest move will ruin their costly photos. The people photographed are often Black elites, with their wealth showing through the delicate lace and impressive embroidery on their clothes. Although one rarely sees a smile, the pride emanates from the photographs. However, something is haunting behind their eyes. Something unsaid, unseen, unheard. Their eerie stare makes me want to look away, for I cannot name them. I do not know the context or fullness of their lives. So I look away because my heart sags in my stomach as I realize I will never know them. No one will ever know them. Their stories, their lives, and the intricacies of their personhood are all tucked away under the gaudy golden frames of the photographs.
But why do I feel such emptiness when I gaze upon them? Why do my eyes prickle with unshed tears? Why does my heart hurt? Is it the unknowing or the never-knowing? Why does it break me? It feels like reading about the tapeworms in young children torn from their homeland, brought overseas carelessly for profit. It reminds me of the blank stares of broken Black bodies that have been shared across time and space from Emmett Till to George Floyd. The sorrow pangs deep within my chest, making breathing uncomfortable. This unknowing knowledge makes my head spin. I take a step back. I breathe. Still, the strings twined along my heart ping and pang with the unknowing knowledge depriving those depicted of life. Dressed in their Sunday best, their hair beautifully coiffed, collars pressed, their static poses show the departed at their best. Even the photos of the children are marred with the knowledge that they have already passed. Perhaps that is why these images haunt me, the knowledge that the subject is lost. Their bodies are buried along with their memories. Memories that I will never know.
The worst photographs are the ones that reek of servitude and bondage. The ones that barely show the beauty of Blackness and instead show images of Black women unilluminated next to the stark pale face of a white child. They appear haunted, like ghosts, meant to fade into the background, fade into nothingness. If they are such an afterthought, why are they even depicted? Why include the nurse and the babe? Why show the subjugation of the Black woman? White elites show their power and status by reducing Black individuals to the background, objects to be seen but not noticed. There is power in reclamation as well. I refuse to recreate these photos that stink of informal bondage in the shape of domestic work.
Nevertheless, I cannot stop staring at the faces in the photos; I cannot stop trying to place them in our memories. To remember is to know, and these people deserve to be known, and they deserve to be missed. I cannot undo the harm that was done, but I can remember, and I can move forward. Today, as I take photos of Black people, I want to capture their beauty and their full lives. I want photos of laughter and joy, not cryptic triptychs and daguerreotypes of an unknown past. Knowing and remembering is a haunting skill that must be practiced. We have a history of forgetting or being forgotten. We have a past that we try to fit together, but there are so many missing puzzle pieces. The past, our past, will never truly be known. As I piece together small chunks of history, I must remember the untold stories of the unidentified African-American.
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