Through the Lens of Black History: Reflections on the Photography of Leandre Jackson

From James Baldwin to Jay-Z, from Maya Angelou to Muhammad Ali, from Prince to Patti LaBelle, and from Fela Kuti to Coretta Scott King, photographer Leandre Jackson has captured countless luminaries with his camera over the last 50 years. With his photography collection now residing at the Penn Libraries’ Kislak Center, join Leandre Jackson in conversation with curator Dr. Samir Meghelli (C’04) as they discuss Jackson's remarkable career documenting the lives and work of Black history-makers of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The conversation will be followed by a reception and a display of Jackson's photographs in the Henry Charles Lea Library.

This event is co-sponsored by the Greenfield Intercultural Center.

About the speakers

Leandre K. Jackson is a widely exhibited and published photographer whose work has appeared in newspapers, magazines, books, CDs, and on television. He has had solo exhibitions at Widener University Art Gallery, Swarthmore College, Antioch College, the Free Library of Philadelphia, Penn’s W.E.B. Du Bois College House, Rider College, and Rowan University. His photographs are part of the permanent collection of Howard University’s Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Swarthmore College, and now Penn’s Kislak Center. He received his B.A. in English from Swarthmore College and his M.A. in Communications from Temple University.

Dr. Samir Meghelli is an award-winning curator, historian, writer, and educator. He currently serves as a Museum Curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History & Culture. He is also a Visiting Scholar-in-Residence at American University’s Metropolitan Policy Center. He received his B.A. (magna cum laude) from the University of Pennsylvania and his M.A., M.Phil., and Ph.D. in History from Columbia University.