Gordon Parks, RIP

The charter school in our neighborhood is called Gordon Parks Elementary. It doesn't serve the upper-middle-class children fleeing Kansas City's public schools. It serves at-risk kids, and serves them well. We're delighted they're here, and so was Gordon Parks.

Lisa Gutierrez, who works two desks down from me and has been following Parks for some years now, has the obit:

Link: Kansas City Star | 03/08/2006 | ‘A great loss for Kansas’.

I disagree with that sentiment. Gordon was 93; he was not long for this world. But he is coming home. He asked to be buried under the big tree, the "learning tree," in his hometown of Fort Scott. The town whose racism he fled as a young man. A town that's still reeling from the fire that gutted its historic district last year. Gordon Parks is coming home -- that's a great gift to Kansas.

Parks was too busy changing the face of film and photography to bother much with television. But HBO did do a marvelous documentary homage to him called "Half Past Autumn" in 2000. As I wrote at the time:

"Half Past Autumn," a beautifully textured documentary on the life of photographer Gordon Parks, debuts 9 p.m. Thursday on HBO. Made with the cooperation of Parks, the 90-minute film takes us through one of the great American lives. It began in poverty and racism near Ft. Scott, Kan., when Parks, the youngest of 15 children, set off for St. Paul following the death of his mother. That led to a chance encounter with a camera that set off a lifetime of creativity, the output of which is astonishing for its breadth and expressiveness.

There were the photo essays in Life, of course; but also the pathbreaking film "Shaft," the award-winning autobiographical novel The Learning Tree, orchestral works, jazz compositions and paintings. To which must now be added this indispensable film.

 

Here's its Amazon listing(Amazon is bundling "Half Past Autumn" with the brilliant "Enron" film from last year; Gordon would've approved)

Comments

[bryon Malik]

Gordon Parks was the reason I picked up the camera....My choice of Weapon.I will forever have you in my memory on my photographic journey.I will uphold your integrity for the little black children of the world.

thank you Mr. Parks.

Bryon Malik