Supreme has unveiled its next Spring 2022 collaboration, this time with the Roy DeCarava Archives for a range of T-shirts and hooded sweatshirts.
Roy DeCarava was born in Harlem in 1919 and was a founding member of several photography movements that are still referenced today. His work was primarily tonal, capturing the lives of those around him in his hometown, where his photographs were first exhibited later in his life, in 1950. DeCarava’s work was praised by critics, with Roberta Smith stating, “DeCarava’s work is itself the best of both worlds.
“DeCarava’s work is itself the best of both worlds. Visually rigorous yet incalculably sensitive to the human predicament and the psychology of everyday life, especially concerning but not limited to African-Americans.”
DeCarava knew composition because he had previously worked as a painter, as well as a printmaker and draftsman. His striking, shadowy silver gelatin prints would go on to inspire Nigerian-American writer Teju Cole to write, “the chiaroscuro effects came from technical choices: a combination of underexposure, darkroom virtuosity and occasionally printing on soft paper.”
Following his first exhibition in 1950, DeCarava became the first African-American photographer to win a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship in 1952. Following that, he collaborated on The Sweet Flypaper of Life with poet Langston Hughes, creating a fictional story about Sister Mary Bradley, a Harlem grandmother. This seminal work is considered the touchstone of anthological photobooks, and it inspired his 1960 work The Sound I Saw, which was a handmade artist’s book that followed the New York City jazz scene at the time.
Supreme has two T-shirts and a hoodie that feature his archival work. The latter, which comes in five colors, has a back print of Malcolm X taken in 1964. T-shirts featuring the Malcolm X photo, as well as another tee depicting DeCarava’s signature work, which is stunningly simple, impactful, focused, and thus intense, are available in a variety of colors.
The Roy DeCarava x Supreme collection will be available in stores and online on May 19 at 11 a.m. EDT in the United States and elsewhere around the world, and on May 21 at 11 a.m. JST in Japan, as usual. All profits from the Roy DeCarava collection will benefit the Schomberg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem.
