*Bently Turner Interview*

Artist Statement

All of us were moved by the resurgence of the Johnsons’ Park neighborhood – to be invited in and see how that was accomplished was certainly a privilege. Early on, it became clear that this revitalization was not possible without many parts of the community pulling together. Our goal was to look at the Block Watch program as one component of the neighborhood association and document the dialog between the residents and their community. To compliment this, we also wanted to show the changes that had occurred over time using pictures we took and gathered from the residents. In the process, we discovered many common themes that contributed to this success and we sought to capture these through our interviews. The focus was on what worked to change the neighborhood and to share the message: “if you want what we have, you can do what we did.”

From an artistic standpoint, decisions about music, pictures and location within the video significantly affected the project. The selection of classic jazz era songs for the transitions was meant to not only acknowledge great contributions to American music, but also to associate the exuberance of post WWII growth that was denied most African-American families with the rebuilding of Johnsons’ Park many years later. Also, we used pictures of older and newer properties to show the transition of the neighborhood and placed them between the interviews to set the context for the viewer and project images to keep in mind while they watched. Initially, we included video of the interviewer but ultimately chose to remove them and use slides to communicate questions so the viewer was always focused on the subject – not distracted by the interviewer.

We hope that you enjoy our blog as much as we enjoyed making it...

Group Media Project

I took these pictures coming back from our interview with Bentley Turner. I tried to get pictures of things that I didn't capture in my photo essay. I focused more on the buildings in the neighborhood - some that have undergone reconstruction and some that haven't.

Alderman Hines Interview