If I were a racist (Photographer’s Cut)
Photography, Power and the Frame We Don't See
In his powerful poem If I Were a Racist, musician and educator Dr. Nathan Holder exposes how racism is often embedded not in overt acts, but in the everyday norms of music education, in what's taught, what's left out, and who gets to be seen as 'legitimate.' His poem is sharp, satirical and painfully honest.
Inspired by Holder’s structure and spirit, I’ve remixed his words through the lens of photography, a medium equally shaped by power, history and exclusion. If I Were a Racist (Photographer’s Cut) explores the hidden biases that define what’s considered ‘great’ photography, how stories are framed, and whose gaze is prioritised in classrooms, galleries and visual culture at large.
This version is not a replacement, but a response, a way of continuing the conversation in another medium.
If I were a racist
If I were a racist,
I’d teach children that talking about photography means,
Aperture, ISO and shutter speed.
If you can’t use these words, you’re not a photographer.
If I were a racist,
I’d showcase Gordon Parks’ fashion shoots,
But never A Harlem Family.
I might even mention how “he broke barriers.”
If I were a racist,
I’d insist all great photography is in black and white,
Because apparently, colour distracts
From the ‘art’.
If I were a racist,
I’d teach “African photography”
As masks, markets and mud huts,
Because of course, Africa is a country.
If I were a racist,
I’d teach that the Masters are
Ansel Adams, Cartier-Bresson, Robert Capa, and Diane Arbus,
Not James Barnor, Zanele Muholi, Carrie Mae Weems or Joy Gregory.
If I were a racist,
I’d say documentary photography was invented
In the West,
And ignore the lens of colonised eyes.
If I were a racist,
I’d call anything outside Europe and America
“Ethnographic” or “World Photography.”
Because context is only cultural when it's not mine.
If I were a racist,
I’d never mention how
Daguerreotypes and slavery
Existed in the same century.
If I were a racist,
I’d say the best cameras
Are Leicas, Hasselblads and Fujis,
Not the kind Gordon Parks called his weapon of choice.
If I were a racist,
I’d shoot ‘diversity’ campaigns
With Black and brown faces,
But never hand them the camera.
If I were a racist,
I’d hold exhibitions in white-walled galleries
In white spaces,
With white curators, writing white captions.
If I were a racist,
I’d think one Black image
On a mood board
Was enough. Representation.
If I were a racist,
I’d teach you to light “for skin tones”,
But only mean pale ones,
Then blame your melanin for the exposure.
If I were a racist,
I’d say “capture the moment,”
While erasing whose moment it was,
And whose story it should be.
If I were a racist,
I’d hang prints of my own work on the walls,
No Black or brown photographers,
Just my “eye.”
If I were a racist,
I’d post black squares on Instagram,
Then ghost every inquiry
For change.
If I were a racist,
I’d never rethink my syllabus,
Or ask what it means
To see through someone, not with them.
If I were a racist,
I’d teach composition as control.
Center what’s familiar,
Crop out what’s not.
If I were a racist,
Even though the pixels may be rich,
The frame
Would remain white.
Reframing the Frame
Photography doesn’t just reflect the world, it shapes how we see it. Who gets to hold the camera, who’s framed, and who gets left in the margins are all political questions, whether we acknowledge them or not.
This remix is a call to look again. To question the so-called ‘neutral’ standards we’ve inherited. To challenge who gets to be the authority, the artist, the subject. And to centre those who’ve long been excluded from the conversation.
Because if we want a more honest, inclusive visual culture, we need to do more than diversify our subjects, we need to change how we see.
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At theBLKGZE, we don’t just reflect the world, we reshape it. We’re building an archive that centres Black vision and truth. We reclaim the frame. We archive what’s been silenced. We honour the everyday and the extraordinary in Black life.
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