Gitterman Gallery is proud to present an exhibition of color photographs by Khalik Allah. The exhibition opens on Friday, March 9th from 6–8 p.m. and continues through Saturday, May 12th.
The works in this exhibition are drawn primarily from images in his recent book Souls Against the Concrete (University of Texas Press, 2017). Made at night on 125th Street and Lexington Avenue in Harlem, the images provide a glimpse into a world and people that many choose to ignore. His subjects are often drug addicts, homeless, or both. Using only the available light from shop windows, street lights, or subway platforms, he photographs them with a slow color film, a combination that produces images full of grain and texture, a visual shorthand for the roughness and intensity of life on the street, and his own struggles early in life. The light is also often harsh or even surreal, resulting in figures awash in blues and reds. Luc Sante, in The New York Times Book Review, wrote, "The result is a panorama of human emotion: sadness, passion, bewilderment, pride, suspicion, amusement, exhaustion — all the faces of the night."
