This exhibition of photographs documents the everyday activities and rituals of one extended black family, the Thorntons, in Mobile and Shady Grove, Alabama, during segregation. The images were originally published in a 1956 photo essay by Parks, an assignment from Life magazine after the Montgomery bus boycotts, but have come to be known around the world for helping to inspire the Civil Rights movement.

These photographs are lent to MMofA by the Gordon Parks Foundation. Throughout the exhibition, MMofA is also partnering with area African American organizations on programs in various disciplines: film, poetry, visual arts and civil rights history.

Exhibition generously underwritten by Mobile County Commissioner, Merceria Ludgood.

Title 1 school program support for the project from the Altmayer Foundation.

Community Programming support by Mobile City Council members: Joel Daves (District 5), Gina Gregory (District 7), Bess Rich (District 6), Frederick D. Richardson, Jr. (District 1), C.J. Small (District 3), and John C. Williams (District 4). Mr. Williams will support a lecture by Dr. John Edwin Mason, author of an upcoming book on Gordon Parks.

Pictured above: Airline Terminal, Atlanta, Georgia, 1956, Gordon Parks, Archival pigment print, Courtesy of and Copyright the Gordon Parks Foundation.

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