During its nine years of existence, the Farm Security Administration employed some of America’s best photographers to document the hardships of living on relief during the Depression. The project resulted in an archive of 200,000 images some of which are featured in Bronzeville: Black Chicago in Pictures, 1941-43, a show that tells the story of Chicago’s urban underbelly, African-Americans chasing the American dream, and the architecture that failed to sustain them.
Thousands of blacks migrated to Chicago in the 1940s, lured by the promise of jobs and a better life. There they found squalid living conditions in the 10-square-mile then known as Bronzeville. Four photographers–Russell Lee, Edwin Rosskam, John Vachon, and Jack Delano—captured the duality of this place, where a vibrant African-American culture developed despite factors that made simple living a struggle.
While the exhibition explores all aspects of life in Bronzeville, from nightlife to churchgoing, the core images in the show painstakingly document everyday life in the dilapidated “kitchenette” apartments of the neighborhood. Lovely facades on the main avenues of Bronzeville disguised these cramped, one-room spaces where entire families lived cheek by jowl. Richard Wright once called the kitchenettes a “death sentence without a trial,” suggesting not only that the buildings were unsafe, but that they were also an impediment to racial equality. Bronzeville is a poignant study in urban planning, a testament that housing remains an essential part of understanding any defining historical moment.
—Diana Lind