CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 5/23/2016

Invisible Man: Gordon Parks and Ralph Ellison in Harlem

Shot for the 1952 photo essay A Man Becomes Invisible, published in the August 25 issue of Life magazine, Gordon Parks' "Untitled, Harlem, New York" is reproduced from Invisible Man: Gordon Parks and Ralph Ellison in Harlem, Steidl's fascinating and expertly composed catalog to the exhibition currently on view at the Art Institute of Chicago. This landmark publication reunites for the first time two little-known journalistic collaborations between the renowned photographer and equally influential writer which illuminated the black experience in postwar America. Most of the photographs, including this one, were never published at the time they were made, and are seen here for the first time, alongside other archival materials, including unpublished manuscripts by Ellison with handwritten notes.