Power to the People: 50 Years of the Black Panthers (Photos)

The Black Panther Party was established in Oakland, Calif., in 1966 by Bobby Seale and Huey Newton. Their goal was to establish real economic, social, and political equality across color lines, gender lines, and among people of same-sex orientation.
 
[RELATED: The Black Panthers and Gay Rights: Lesbian Angela Davis recalls the encounters with Jean Genet that changed how the Black Panthers dealt with gay liberation.]

Steven Kasher Gallery’s exhibit "Power to the People: The Black Panthers in Photographs by Stephen Shames and Graphics by Emory Douglas" coincides with the 50th anniversary of the party’s founding.

The exhibition features over 100 black-and-white photographs of the Panthers by Stephen Shames, many previously unseen. Also on view in the exhibition are 50 vintage copies of The Black Panther, the official party newspaper with front and back cover graphics by Emory Douglas. Captions to the photographs are provided by Panther founder Bobby Seale and other Panther leaders, including Kathleen Cleaver, Ericka Huggins, Emory Douglas, and Jamal Joseph, culled from interviews conducted by Shames and Seale. The exhibition launches the publication of Power to the People: The World of the Black Panthers by Stephen Shames and Bobby Seale, published by Abrams, 256 pages, with over 200 photographs by Stephen Shames.

Admired, reviled, emulated, misunderstood, the Black Panther Party was one of the most creative and influential responses to racism and economic inequality in American history. Founded in October 1966 by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, the Panthers preached the right of black people to self-determination, which included the right to self-defense. They advocated armed self-defense to counter police brutality, and initiated a program of patrolling the police with shotguns — and law books.

The Black Panther Party sought to build a community through service to the people. The Panthers initiated more than 50 community survival programs including free breakfast for school children, free medical clinics, free food, clothing, and legal aid programs, sickle cell screening, and an award-winning charter school. The Panthers electrified a generation of black youth and would become emblematic of the Black Power and anti-imperialist movements that shaped the tumultuous years of the late 1960s and early ’70s. The Panthers embraced the ideals of gender equality and gay liberation and sought to forge alliances with women’s rights and gay rights organizations.

"Power to the People: The Black Panthers in Photographs by Stephen Shames and Graphics by Emory Douglas"
Steven Kasher Gallery
September 15–October 29
Opening Reception: September 15, 6–8 p.m.
515 W. 26th St., New York, N.Y., 10001

Photo: Stephen Shames
Kathleen Cleaver, communications secretary and the first female member of the party’s decision-making Central Committee, talks with Black Panthers from Los Angeles, in West Oakland, California, USA, July 28, 1968
Gelatin silver print, printed 2016
16 x 20 in., edition of 8

Stephen Shames
Oakland, Calif.: Black Panther Chairman and cofounder Bobby Seale speaks at a Free Huey rally in Defermery Park (named by the Panthers Bobby Hutton Park) in West Oakland. Left of Seale is Bill Brent, who later went to Cuba. Right is Wilford Hol, July 28, 1968

Gelatin silver, printed 2006
16 x 20 in.
Signed and numbered by photographer verso; edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
Memorial mural for Jonathan Jackson, who was killed August 7, 1970, during an attempt to kidnap California Superior Court Judge Harold Haley and three others to exchange for the freedom of his brother, George Jackson; the mural was put up in the Roxbury section of Boston, 1970

Gelatin silver print, printed 2016

16 x 20 in.
Signed and numbered by photographer verso; edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
Black Panther sells The Black Panther, the party's newspaper, in the Roxbury section of Boston, 1970

Gelatin silver print, printed 2016
20 x 16 in.

Edition of 8 

Stephen Shames
Two women with bags of food at the People's Free Food Program, one of the Panthers' survival programs, Palo Alto, Calif., 1972

Gelatin silver print, printed 2016
20 x 16 in.

Edition of 8 

Stephen Shames
Sandbags line the walls of the New Haven Panther office to protect against a suspected police raid during the Bobby Seale trial, New Haven, Conn., May 1, 1970

Gelatin silver print, printed 2016

16 x 20 in.

Edition of 8 

Stephen Shames
Oakland, Calif.: Angela Davis, who was a Black Panther for six months, speaks at a Free Huey rally in Defermery Park, November 12, 1969

Gelatin silver, printed 2006
16 x 20 in.

Signed and numbered by photographer verso; edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
Brooklyn, N.Y.: Writing on wall: “We the Blacks must rise,” 1970

Gelatin silver print
16 x 20 in
Signed and numbered by photographer verso; Edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
San Francisco: Children at a Free Huey, Free Bobby rally in front of the Federal Building, February 1970

Gelatin silver print
20 x 16 in.

Signed and numbered by photographer verso; edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
Free Breakfast Program, Chicago, 1970

Gelatin silver print
121/2x 19 in.
Signed by photographer verso 

Stephen Shames
Free Huey Rally in Front of the Alameda County Courthouse, Oakland, Calif., September 1968

Gelatin silver, printed 2006
16 x 20 in.
Signed by photographer verso; edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
Oakland, Calif.: Black Panthers carry George Jackson's coffin into St. Augustine’s Church for his funeral service as a huge crowd watches., August 28, 1971

Gelatin silver print, printed 2006
16 x 20 in.

Signed and numbered by photographer verso; Edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
Panthers March at Defermery Path, Oakland, Calif., in Rally to Free Huey, 1969

Vintage gelatin silver print, printed ca. 1969
8 x 10 in.
Signed, dated, titled, and stamped by photographer verso 

Stephen Shames
Oakland, Calif.: Black Panther children in a classroom at the Intercommunal Youth Institute, the Black Panther school., 1971

Gelatin silver print
16 x 20 in.

Signed and numbered by photographer verso; edition of 8 + 2 Aps 

Stephen Shames
Boy gives raised fist salute as he and a friend sit on a statue in front of the New Haven County Courthouse at a demonstration during the Bobby Seale and Ericka Huggins trial, New Haven, Conn., May 1, 1970

Gelatin silver print, printed 2016
20 x 16 in.
Edition of 8