Not long ago Bottega Veneta descended on Detroit to hold its Salon 03 show, but came under criticism by locals for not inviting many of the city’s prominent Black creatives.

Other photographers highlighted in the show comprise Dana Scruggs, the first Black female photographer to shoot a Rolling Stone cover in 2019, Arielle Bobb-Willis, Awol Erizku, Jamal Nxedlana, Nadine Ijewere, Renell Medrano, Adrienne Raquel, Quil Lemons, Stephen Tayo, Daniel Obasi, and Namsa Leuba.

“They are showing the vast range of Black experience and Black identity in the present day. “They all use the medium of fashion photography as a form of social justice, by imprinting the Black experience sometimes in new ways or in traditional ways,” Barr said. Plans for a physical showcase were ultimately thwarted by the pandemic but the institute’s curators persevered, believing that the work deserved to be platformed. The New Black Vanguard first came to life as a fat coffee table tome back in 2019, led by writer and critic Antwaun Sargent. Known for his depictions of Black utopias, such as the series I’m Doing Pretty Hood In My Pink Polo, which he made with Dazed in 2016, Mitchell has long sought to visualise what he calls a “full range of expressions possible for a Black man in the future”.

This includes Tyler Mitchell, who became the first Black photographer to shoot the cover of US Vogue, doing so with an image of Beyoncé – though he was already well on his way to changing the face of fashion imagery before that moment. It gives an “incredibly dynamic, youthful in spirit” quality to the work on show, as Nancy Barr, the museum’s curator, said.įrom Micaiah Carter, to Campbell Addy, to Ruth Ossai, the exhibition honours some of the most in-demand creatives of the moment.

The Black experience is anything but monolithic and most of these featured artists, from Nigeria, South Africa, London, and New York, are not yet 30 years old. Opening last weekend, The New Black Vanguard: Photography Between Art and Fashion will display the work of 15 trailblazing photographers across 100-plus portraits, editorials, and test shoots, pilfered from magazines, ad campaigns, and social media. A first-of-its-kind exhibition pays homage to an incumbent generation of Black fashion photographers in Detroit.

The New Black Vanguard by Addy Campbell