Radical Justice: Lifting Every Voice

2022 AIGA 50 Books | 50 Covers Award Winner

Radical Justice: Lifting Every Voice brings together two bodies of socially-engaged photographic portraiture by Accra Shepp, who has documented New York City’s Occupy Wall Street movement starting in 2011 and its racial justice/BLM protests since 2020.

Working in the style of August Sander with a large format camera and black and white film, Shepp pictures fellow New Yorkers on their city’s streets in acts of sit-ins and active protest, both unplanned and highly organized, independent and unified, to address notions of the 99% and 1%, which have become part of the American political vernacular. Bearing witness to defining events of the last decade echoing the United States’ longer historical arch, Shepp’s empathetic depictions of fellow citizens standing up for the Constitution’s fair protection provide a prophetic mirror of current events, which reflects back centuries to where the American experiment began, to suggest where we’ll find ourselves in the years to come.

“One Big Swarm of People” Foreword by Salamishah Tillet, 2022 Pulitzer Prize Winner for Criticism

Hilton Als

"Accra Shepp’s “Radical Justice,” is a vision. Clear-eyed and unique, Shepp’s photographs are also a powerful record of hope and resiliency, framed by a compassionate eye interested in these times, and in times to come. An uplifting and necessary book."

Makeda Best

"Brought together here with portraits made in 2020, Accra Shepp’s 2011 portraits are revealed to be prophetic in their sensitivity to spatial politics and recognition of a dynamic and emerging social movement. Shepp’s visual storytelling—grounded in an intrinsic respect for the individual and demonstrating a nuanced understanding of environmental and historical contexts—is a model for our time."

Dawoud Bey

"One of the things that good portraits have the capacity to do is to reveal the human community to itself, creating a momentary sense of intimacy and familiarity between strangers. Accra Shepp’s engaging portraits do this. Photographing at a moment of profound social upheaval, he brings us visually into a conversation with our fellow citizens. This is important and timely work."

Cornel West

"Accra Shepp is a powerful artist– a funkmaster of human portraits who keeps it real shot through with rich technique and deep love."