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The Museum of Contemporary Photography is the world’s premier college art museum dedicated to photography.

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“Part of the exhibit’s brilliance is its deliberate disinterest in defining Till’s path as any one person might imagine it,” writes Anya Sesay (@anyanic0lette) in the Milwaukee @journalsentinel. “Instead, each photograph compels us to make room for every version of who Till could’ve been. Not simply to honor his memory, but to reckon with the limits of our civic imagination today.”

Thank you Anya, for seeing the vision of this show so clearly. Anya is, as it turns out, one of my former Harvard students! Watching her go from strength to strength as a journalist is such a gift. She knew why I wanted to curate a show like this long before most as we developed ideas in the classroom. I’m so grateful for her care, and for making the drive to Chicago :)

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A sacrifice zone is a portion of a municipality where government and industry have offloaded their pollution. @ladylovelyloxx of @nrdc_org details how her home, the Southeast Side, has been used as Chicago's dumping ground for polluting industries. She references the famous petcoke stacks documented by Terry Evans.

This panel at @mocpchi supplmented the photography exhibition STORM this past summer. Joined by co-sponsor @senatorgraciela of the Make Polluters Pay Act, the necessity of our advocacy was made even more urgent.

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Dawoud Bey is featured in the exhibition, If Emmett Till Lived: Freedom on American Ground, on view at The Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago through December 19, 2026.

In his photographic series Harlem, USA, Dawoud Bey explores the history and community of the iconic neighborhood. Growing up in Queens, Bey was drawn to his family’s ties to Harlem: his parents had met at a local church, and many relatives and family friends lived there. At sixteen, after encountering the photographs of James Van Der Zee, Bey began making photographs himself. Together with Bey’s personal connection to the neighborhood, would later inspire his Harlem, USA series (1975–79).

“The relationships and exchanges that I had with some of these people are experiences I will never forget. It is in those relationships and the lives of the people that these pictures recall that the deeper meaning of these photographs can be found.” - Dawoud Bey, 1979

Image: Dawoud Bey, A Woman and Two Boys Passing, Harlem, NY, 1978, gelatin silver print, image: 8 1/16 x 11 7/8 inches, paper: 11 x 14 inches, framed: 17 1/8 x 21 1/8 x 1 1/2 inches © Dawoud Bey Courtesy: the artist and Sean Kelly, New York

@dawoudbey @mocpchi #DawoudBey

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Emmett Till was robbed not only of his life, but of the future he deserved to live.

Last week in Chicago, I visited If Emmett Till Lived, a powerful exhibition imagining the life he might have led. Masterfully curated by THEE @sarahelizabethlewis1 and Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr., Emmett’s cousin, best friend, and last surviving witness to his kidnapping.

For the first time, remembering Emmett brought not only grief, but joy in imagining him as a father, a husband, and a man with dreams of his own.

At a time when history is under attack, this exhibition reminds us of what was stolen, what could have been, and why we must continue fighting. 🙏🏾Thank you @sarahelizabethlewis1 and Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr

If Emmett Till Lived is on view in Chicago at @mocpchi through December 19. Go experience THIS!

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Museum of Contemporary Photography

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What does it mean to be alive? Is it to continuously struggle and experience hardship, persevering each time until you eventually can’t anymore? Or, instead, about the beauty of the ordinary, the simple fact of existing and being with what is around you?

A new exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College explores these questions surrounding life by having viewers imagine what Emmett Till’s life could have been like if he had not been killed at 14 in a racially motivated murder in 1955. It shows what he loved, the memories he made and the memories he could have made had he not died. “If Emmett Till Lived: Freedom on American Ground,” is on display through Dec. 19 and free to the public. The museum, 600 S. Michigan Ave., is open every day except Sundays and holidays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Click the link in bio for more.

📝 Karina Hans
📸 Sacha Twemlow

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How is art connected to advocacy?

Climate Superfund Act Co-sponsor @senguzman details the relationship between the two as a part of a panel at @mocpchi and how we can move forward to make our planet more livable.

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Join us October 28 @columbiachi when photographer and artist @tobishinobi breaks down Finding Your Perspective: building a visual voice, editing and presenting your work, and positioning yourself for the kind of clients and projects you actually want.

Tobi Shinobi is an award-winning photographer, videographer and creative strategist based between London and Chicago.

He has worked with Audi, Adobe and Sony, is a former Sony Global Imaging Ambassador and Adobe Lightroom Ambassador, and spent five years as Lead Creative Strategist at TikTok. With 175,000 followers across social platforms, his work is held in the permanent collection at Grand Valley State University, has been shown in Times Square and at SCOPE Miami Beach, and in 2026 he presented his solo exhibition A Shinobi Called Tobi in Madrid.

He is an MFA candidate at the @saicphotography and serves on the Museum Council at the @mocpchi

Register with the 🔗 in our bio - students with ID are free!!

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exploring the latest gallery at the @mocpchi today.
#mocpchi

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If you’re in Chicago, see this exhibit.

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We extend our deepest gratitude to Okla Jones at ESSENCE for his considered overview of the vital presence of Chicago’s Black artistic practices central to this year’s Chicago Exhibition Week (CXW).

“Chi-town has never needed much help proving the strength of its art scene, but Chicago Exhibition Week offered an unusually concentrated way to experience it,” Jones said. “Trying to experience everything would have been impossible. My time in Chicago instead became an opportunity to see several exhibitions with vastly different approaches to Black life, history and artistic practice, while getting a better understanding of the city through the spaces where the work was being presented.”

Throughout the week, Chicago’s artistic landscape emerged in its full breadth, shaped in meaningful part by the distinct perspectives and practices of Black artists and curators. From artists Lindsay Adams, Pope.L, and Karimah Ashadu to the curatorial brilliance of Hamza Walker, Jadine Collingwood, and Sarah Lewis, CXW’s programming illuminated the intellectual and creative contributions of Black artists and cultural practitioners to Chicago’s artistic identity and the cultural infrastructure that continues to nurture their work.

“That richness is such a defining part of Chicago,” described Chanelle Lacy, Head of Programming, Partnerships & Memberships at Gertie. “CXW gave us a platform to celebrate it, connect it, and bring more eyes to it.”

Read the full story at the link in bio.

@gertie.chicago @chicagoexhibitionweek @sarahelizabethlewis1 @mocpchi @rensoc @karimahashadu @hamza_walker @corbettvsdempsey @lindsaybriadams @patrongallery @mcachicago @coolhandoak @essence

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Sarah Elizabeth Lewis has won a 2026 Rabkin Prize.⁠
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We sat down with Sarah for a conversation about her work and ideas, as we did with each of this year’s Rabkin Prize winners. To listen to Sarah’s full Rabkin Interview, go to the link in our bio.⁠
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Sarah Lewis is currently the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Humanities and an associate professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University, and the founder of Vision & Justice. She has authored and edited over 60 publications including “The Unseen Truth: When Race Changed Sight in America” (Harvard University Press, 2024); “The Rise: Creativity, The Gift of Failure, and the Search for Mastery” (Simon & Schuster, 2014); volumes “Carrie Mae Weems” (MIT Press, 2021) and “Vision & Justice” (Aperture, 2016); “Coreen Simpson: A Monograph” (Aperture, 2025) and “Race Stories: Essays on the Power of Images” (Aperture and The New York Times, 2024). Lewis was named to TIME’s 2026 “The Closers” list, for her work toward greater equality in the U.S. She has organized landmark convenings, founded a Vision & Justice book series, and curated exhibitions, including “If Emmett Till Lived: Freedom on American Ground” (Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago, September 2026). Her TED talk, “Embrace the Near Win,” has over 3 million views. Her writing has been published in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Artforum, and The New York Review of Books, and her work has been featured in Vogue, The Boston Globe and The New York Times. Lewis is the recipient of honorary degrees from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts, and Pratt Institute, along with the Walter Channing Cabot Fellowship at Harvard University, the Andrew Carnegie Fellowship, the Arthur Danto/American Society for Aesthetics Prize from the American Philosophical Association, the Freedom Scholar Award from Association for the Study of African American Life and History, and the Infinity Award for Critical Writing and Research from the International Center of Photography.⁠
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Portrait by Kevin J. Miyazaki⁠
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#rabkinprize #worthlistening

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