TLC

By Suzanne Révy

Consider for a moment the humble snapshot. These naive pictures that were never meant for museum walls often pack a punch far greater than the most carefully crafted pieces of art. Photographers and artists understand this, and often employ the snapshot aesthetic or appropriate vernacular pictures to create visual connections and conversations. It is in this vein that the Griffin Museum presents its third of four exhibitions titled State of the Union that looks critically at the United States in its 250th year. The most recent show, TLC, was organized by Delphine Sims, Assistant Curator in the Department of Photography at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and brings together four artists of color, Harlan Bozeman, Star Montana, Charles H. Lee and Alanna Airitam, who spotlight marginalized communities with dignity and humanity. Also on view, an immersive projection by Cummings Fellow Lua Kobayashi.  Both shows are on view through October 25th, 2026. 

From the series Out the E by Harlan Bozeman, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

In the main Gallery, the Griffin has installed prints by three of the four artists with magnets, large vinyl and very little glazing. Such seeming effortlessness feels like the pages of family albums or archives casually affixed to the walls, inviting a deep dive into ephemeral traces of personal narratives from communities who have been mournfully overlooked. 

From the series Out the E by Harlan Bozeman, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

From the series Out the E by Harlan Bozeman, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

Harlan Bozeman’s pictures are probably the most deliberately structured, yet he employs an informal intimacy. The familiarity between the photographer and his sitters feels like Bozeman is an older brother photographing his siblings. His project, Out the E was made in Elaine, Arkansas which suffered a brutal massacre in 1919. As Bozeman researched the history of the area, he discovered an absence of written and visual documentation that was not merely an oversight, but a deliberate attempt to hide a shameful past, and to erase Black citizens. His black and white pictures of teens at a playground, lying supine during a game break or hanging by the fingertips from a basketball net aim to restore a sense of belonging without disregarding the past through metaphor. To my eye, the figure holding fast to the basketball net brings the horror of lynching to mind, while a picture of two young men in a cemetery recalls the 1919 terror.

“TLC” curated by Delphine Sims, Assistant Curator in the Department of Photography at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, features vinyl and magnet installations, including this work by Star Montana. (Installation photograph by Suzanne Revy)

“Family Portrait” by Star Montana, from the series By the rivers, I stood and stared into the sun, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

“Large East LA Landscape” by Star Montana, from the series By the rivers, I stood and stared into the sun, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

Star Montana mixes contemporary photography and her own family snapshots to emphasize family histories in her project, By the rivers, I stood and stared into the sun. Mounted salon-style, there are echoes between the generations and she shines a light on the experience of Mexican immigrants in Los Angeles. Her enlarged commercial portraits are the kind made at a JC Penny or Sears store, complete with pebble finish. Typically carried in wallets, their outsized scale is at once nostalgic and haunting. These pictures rarely appear in the history of photography, and yet, millions of them were made, raising questions around agency and memory. Combined with contemporary landscapes and portraits, Montana underscores the humanity of a marginalized and often ignored segment of southern California.

“So you wanna be a bull rider?” by Charles H. Lee from the series Sweat + Dirt, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

“The Calm Before the Rodeo” by Charles H. Lee, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

“TLC” curated by Delphine Sims, Assistant Curator in the Department of Photography at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, features vinyl and magnet installations including this work by Charles H. Lee. (Installation photograph by Suzanne Revy)

Charles Lee’s Sweat and Dirt features Black cowboys from around the country. Lee disrupts the heroic white male “Marlboro man” trope in color and black and white images that are strikingly tender. Using a snapshot quality, many of his pictures are the in-between moments at practice and at rodeos. “So you wanna be a bull rider” is a poignant embrace between a cowboy and his toddler. There is a subtle humor in the repose featuring the denim jeans and boots of someone resting on an open car door. The mythic grandeur around the idea of “cowboys” and “country” is replaced by a quotidian sensibility, while Lee asks, do we belong here? The answer, it seems to me, is a resounding yes. 

“J-Town and Youngsta” by Alanna Airitam from the series Black Diamonds, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

“Nikon” by Alanna Airitam, from the series Black Diamonds, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

“Pushback” by Alanna Airitam, from the series Black Diamonds, courtesy of the artist and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

In contrast to the more familial aesthetics of the three previous artists, Alanna Airitam presents dramatized portraits of Black biker gang members bathed in classic Rembrandt light. These portraits are formally constructed with painted backdrops that recall the work of Harlem Renaissance photographer James Van der Zee. Like Van der Zee, Airitam emphasizes body language and sartorial expression through glowing light, symbolic props and eloquent gestures. She reminds viewers that far too few faces of color appear in the annals of art history. These pictures take a step toward correcting that absence. 

“The Persistence of Memories” by Lua Kobayashi. (Installation view by Suzanne Revy).

In the Griffin Gallery, Cummings Fellow Luo Kobayashi presents “Persistence of Memories,” a moving projection that springs from visits and conversations she had with members of the Japanese community in Boston. The eight minute loop is mesmerizing through forest bathing, smiling faces and the surreal tingling of utensils flying across the walls. Taken together, these artists are addressing difficult themes of erasure and absence, and yet there is a genial ethos of compassion permeating the museum. 

For more information: https://griffinmuseum.org