Moutoussamy-Ashe, Jeanne
1951-present · Contribution: 1975-present
Photographer; author
Spent five years (1977-1982) documenting the Gullah Geechee community of South Carolina’s Daufuskie Island before development transformed it, publishing the results as Daufuskie Island (1982) with a foreword by Alex Haley, and authored Viewfinders (1986), the first book-length history of Black women photographers in America
Portraits are AI-generated interpretations, not photographs.
Quick facts
- Born
- 1951, Chicago, Illinois
- Active since
- 1975
- Category
- Press & Photography
- Best known for
- Documenting the Gullah Geechee of Daufuskie Island; historian of Black women photographers
Impact on the world
Moutoussamy-Ashe preserved a distinct Creole culture on the brink of erasure and, in Viewfinders, recovered a century and a half of overlooked Black women photographers from obscurity.
An alternative history
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Sources
- Source lookupFind
Whitney Museum of American Art
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Related visionaries
Smith, Ming
1947-present
Became the first Black woman member of the Kamoinge Workshop around 1973 and, in 1979, the first African American woman photographer whose work was acquired by the Museum of Modern Art’s permanent collection
Higgins, Chester Jr.
1946-present
Spent nearly four decades as a New York Times staff photographer while producing an acclaimed body of work documenting the global African diaspora, published in books including Feeling the Spirit (1994) and Echo of the Spirit (2004)
Smith, Beuford
1936-2025
Joined the Kamoinge Workshop as an early member in 1965 and later served as its president, co-founded the Black Photographers Annual in 1972, and spent six decades documenting Black community life, jazz musicians, and street scenes in New York City
Cowans, Adger W.
1936-present
Became a founding member of the Kamoinge Workshop in 1963 after working alongside Gordon Parks at Life magazine, and went on to become the first African American still photographer in Hollywood, working on more than 30 feature films