VCU news

By Tom Gresham

Chris Hancock resisted the first two times he was urged to submit his work to the Virginia Poverty Law Center’s photography competition. He did not think of the subjects in his photographs as fitting the description of poor.

“In many ways, they’re rich,” said Hancock, a graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University.

Still, when a third person aware of Hancock’s photography advised him to submit to the competition, he relented. Subsequently, an esteemed jury selected Hancock’s work for first place.

Hancock’s portraits of the residents of Fancy Gap, Va., will be among the 49 images on display at the Scott House on the VCU Monroe Park campus from Oct. 14 to Oct. 28 for the juried exhibit that grew out of the competition. “Through Different Eyes: The Faces of Poverty in Virginia” will be open to the public from noon to 6 p.m. each day during its two-week run at VCU. It will then begin a tour of the state that could take a year or longer. Among its planned stops is the Virginia General Assembly building.

The exhibit is designed to remind viewers of what specifically those living in poverty look like. Photographs featured in the exhibit forgo the obvious opportunity to portray “the poor” as easy stereotypes served up for pity. Instead, those photographed will likely remind many viewers of themselves. Ten percent of Virginians live in poverty, according to the Virginia Poverty Law Center.

Jeffrey Allison, a VCU graduate and the interim director of the statewide education programs at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, is serving as curator for the exhibit. He said he was excited at the preponderance of strong photography submitted for the competition, explaining that the wedding of social justice and documentary photography produced a powerful result.

“When we went through the final box of slides for this exhibit, I was blown away by the quality of the photographs,” Allison said. “There are some incredible photographs in this show. I was really happy to see that the photographers in no way made their subjects out to be clichés.”

The lack of the condescension in the photographs can be partly attributed to several of the photographers having experienced poverty themselves. Hancock, for instance, said he considered himself poor for the first 20 years of his life.

Hancock moved to Fancy Gap from Washington, D.C., at the age of 10 with his mother. He never completely felt as though he fit in during his years in the small, rural community, but he returned with his camera while he was at VCU to better understand his adopted hometown.

Hancock spent somewhere between two and seven days with the subjects of each of his panoramic portraits. Instead of snapping photographs constantly, he spent time learning about them during their daily activities. And he pitched in, helping around the house or working on the farm. Only then, when he understood what made each subject unique, did he pick up his camera.

“I really believe that the taking the pictures part of photography is only about 20 percent of the job,” Hancock said. “It’s also about how well you know your subject and how well you know your setting and how well you know how to put something visually together so that it tells the full story.”

Hancock, who has a burgeoning freelance photography career, expects he will continue to take portraits of Fancy Gap residents for the rest of his life. He said he enjoys the personal interaction, and the subjects seem to truly appreciate the results.

“They sometimes tell me they see something in the pictures that they didn’t realize about themselves,” Hancock said. “That helps them.”

Hancock’s first-place selection was made by a nationally recognized jury. Jurors included Robert Sullivan, longtime editor of LIFE magazine, LIFE.com and LIFE books; Brooks Johnson, photography curator of the Chrysler Museum; Tom Rankin, executive director of the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University; and Willie E. Williams, a celebrated photographer, curator and educator.

Numerous volunteers — including students, administrators and faculty from VCU and the University of Richmond School of Law, and representatives of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts and some legal aid societies — put together the exhibit.

Photographers from across the state contributed to the exhibit, according to Allison, and rural, urban and suburban settings all are apparent. It makes for a comprehensive look at poverty in Virginia, he said.

“It’s been really exciting to watch as the project develops and the exhibit comes to fruition,” Allison said.

In conjunction with the exhibit, a publication of photos, testimonials and essays on the social justice aspects of poverty law in Virginia will be available for purchase in 2006. Each of the 71 photographs the jury selected for the exhibit will be in the publication.

Hancock said his profile has been raised with his first-place honor.

“It’s been very flattering to be noticed,” Hancock said. “But it’s not about pride or boosting my ego. It’s just feeling good that people see something in my work and that that work can make some contribution to society. I’m really happy to be a part of something like this.”

“Through Different Eyes” starts Oct. 14 with an opening event that will include remarks from Gov. Mark Warner, chairman of the event’s honorary committee. Tickets for the opening are $50 and will benefit the Virginia Poverty Law Center.

For more information on the “Through Different Eyes” exhibit, go to www.vplc.org or call 782-9430.