Now age 85, award-winning photographer Roland L. Freeman’s photography career began on August 28, 1963, when he borrowed a camera from a friend to photograph the March on Washington.
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“I really wanted to say something about what was going on. I chose photography as my vehicle,” he says. The new exhibition, Roland L. Freeman: Portfolio, looks back at the artist’s extraordinary archive of work documenting Black America during the 1960s, ‘70s, and ‘80s.
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Born in Baltimore and raised in rural Maryland, Freeman grew closely involved in the Civil Rights Movement after he unexpectedly joined his first march while taking his grandmother to buy a new dress for Mother’s Day.“There were protests held outside a Baltimore department store because Black women weren’t allowed to try on dresses,” Freeman remembers. “My grandmother said, ‘Give me one of those signs. I’m sick of this crap!’ That started it, and I’ve never looked back.”
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