As Baltimore and the rest of the country brace for the trials of the six officers accused in the death of Freddie Gray last spring, the frayed relationship between African American men and the police are front and center in people’s minds. Tom's guest now is Gracie Xavier, a photographer with a background in psychology and social work, who took her lens and her artistic eye to one of the iconic locations in the Black community, the barbershop, where she explored perceptions of Black male identity, from the perspective of some of the men themselves, and the culture at large.
An exhibition of the photographs that grew out of that endeavor opens Friday night at Gallery CA on Oliver Street in Baltimore’s Station North Arts & Entertainment District. Gracie Xavier is currently living and working in Detroit, and she joins Tom on the phone this morning from the Motor City.
The exhibition is called Cutz: Black Men in Focus. It opens at Gallery CA on Oliver Street in Baltimore on Friday night with a reception that begins at 6:00, and you can check out the show until October 24th.
