A Beautiful Ghetto

On April 18th, 2015, Baltimore erupted into mass protests in response to the brutal and heinous murder of Freddie Gray by the Baltimore police. Suddenly, the eyes of the world turned to Baltimore. In nearly 100 stunning black and white photos, Allen documents the uprising, his city, and the people who live there, revealing a world of love, courage, struggle and hope. Each photo reveals the personality, beauty and spirit of Baltimore and those who live there, as his camera complicates the stereotype of a “ghetto”. We find smiles where one might least expect them, hope doing battle against a system that sows desperation and fear, and above all, resistance, to the unrelenting pressures of racism in twenty-first-century America.

““Allen’s work demonstrates a connection between resistance as a daily activity, a way of life in the ghetto, and resistance as a political act, as played out in the streets last spring. He documents resistance without judgment, without asking the usual questions that outsiders might: Is it justified? Is it effective? Is it legal? Resistance is represented not as a tactic, but as a fundamental aspect of life.”
—Washington Post

Devin Allen is one of the first amateur photographers to have their his work featured on the cover of Time magazine. His photographs have also appeared in New York Magazine, the Washington Post, the New York Times, CNN, BBC, NBC News, Aperture Magazine, and Yahoo!

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Devin Allen, a Baltimore native, is only the third amateur photographer to have their photograph appear on the cover of Time. His work has also been featured in New York Magazine, the Washington Post, the New York Times, CNN, BBC, NBC News, Aperture Magazine, and "Yahoo!." Allen's photographs have been exhibited in the Smithsonian.