July 2, 2008 marks 100th birthday of Charles "Teenie" Harris, prolific Pittsburgh photographer

Charles "Teenie" Harris, Self Portrait of Charles "Teenie" Harris, in Harris studio, c. 1940 , Carnegie Museum of Art, Heinz Family Fund

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania…Noted Pittsburgh photographer, Charles “Teenie” Harris, who created an incomparable record of historic events and daily life in Pittsburgh’s African American community between 1936 and 1975, would have celebrated his 100th birthday on July 2, 2008.

Carnegie Museum of Art acquired the Teenie Harris Archive of more than 80,000 negatives in 2001 and invites the public to celebrate the artist and his work by browsing through more than 45,000 of his images on view on the museum’s web site at www.cmoa.org.

Teenie Harris worked for 40 years as staff photographer for the Pittsburgh Courier, one of the largest and most influential Black newspapers in the country. From the Depression to the Civil Rights Movement, Harris recorded personalities and events during a period of momentous change for Black Americans. He also captured thousands of average people at work and at play, creating a richly detailed visual history of 20th-century life.

“Teenie has left us with an unrivaled collection of images that document African American and Pittsburgh history,” said Louise Lippincott, chief curator and curator of fine arts at Carnegie Museum of Art. “We’re happy to be able to provide the community access to Teenie’s body of work via the web site and outreach, and that we can share Pittsburgh’s vitality and historical significance to the world beyond our three rivers.”

Teenie Harris was able to photograph a wide range of notable people from sports, music, and politics on their visits to Pittsburgh. Dizzy Gillespie, Sarah Vaughan, Louis Armstrong, Lena Horne, Jackie Robinson, Martin Luther King, Jr., Richard Nixon, and John F. Kennedy, along with Pittsburgh-born luminaries Billy Eckstine, George Benson, and Ahmad Jamal, are just some of the celebrities photographed by Harris. In 2007, his work was designated a “We the People” project by the National Endowment for the Humanities. This initiative supports projects that explore significant events and themes in U.S. history and culture that advance knowledge of the principles that define the country.

Today, Teenie Harris’s images have been examined by thousands of people through projects such as One Shot, the Ron K. Brown/Evidence dance program inspired by the life of Harris and accompanied by Rhapsody in Black and White: The Photographs of Charles “Teenie” Harris, an exhibition of his photographs.One Shot and Rhapsody in Black and White—organized by the August Wilson Center for African American Culture—are touring the United States and will have visited 15 different venues during the 2007–2008 seasons. Both workswill be included as part of the Wilson Center’s inaugural season in its new facility in 2009. LOOKING FORWARD: Images of Children by Charles “Teenie” Harris was also organized by the August Wilson Center in 2006.

Other exhibitions including images of Harris’s work are Carryin’ On, on view at the Andy Warhol Museum in 2007; Soul Soldiers: African Americans and the Vietnam Conflict, organized by the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania in 2006; and Spirit of a Community: The Photographs of Charles “Teenie” Harris, organized by the Westmoreland Museum of American Art in 2001. In 1997, Carnegie Museum of Art included vintage prints by Harris in the Pittsburgh Revealed exhibition, and in 2003 and 2006, the museum invited the community to help identify the people, places, and events in Harris’s photographs in Documenting Our Past: The Teenie Harris Archive Projects I and II. Harris’s photographs were the focus of One Shot Harris by noted author Stanley Crouch, and One Shot: The Life and Times of Teenie Harris, a documentary of Harris’s life by filmmaker Kenneth Love.

“What a valuable work Mr. Harris created and what valuable work [Carnegie Museum of Art is] continuing by archiving and allowing the use of his images,” states Chris Moore of WQED-TV. WQED-TV has used Teenie Harris’s images for Barbershops: Pittsburgh Stylin’, 2003, Torchbearers, 2006, and Jim Crow Pennsylvania, 2007, a continuing series of programs focused on the Black experience in Pennsylvania.

Carnegie Museum of Art has an active outreach program where oral historians meet with individuals of Harris’s era to review the images and record their stories. The museum’s community liaison, Cecile Shellman, visits groups in the region and presents information on Harris and his work.

In celebration of Harris’s 100th birthday, the August Wilson Center for African American Culture will display a portion of the Harris photograph collection at Gallery 209/9 from July 2 to 12, 2008. The photographs on display will be from LOOKING FORWARD and Rhapsody in Black and White. There will be an opening reception on July 2, Teenie’s birthday, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. At the reception, Harris’s son, Teenie Harris, Jr., will speak about his father’s legacy and work. Those interested in attending the Wilson Center event should call 412.281.5484 or e-mail rholandes@augustwilsoncenter.org.

A retrospective exhibition of Teenie Harris’s work is being planned and is tentatively scheduled for 2010 at Carnegie Museum of Art.

Images from the Teenie Harris Archive are available by contacting the communications office at 412.622.3316 or kishl@carnegiemuseums.org

Support
Vintage prints and negatives in the Teenie Harris Archive were acquired with funds provided by the Heinz Family Fund and by gift of the artist and the Harris Estate. General support for museum programs is provided by the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, The Heinz Endowments, and Allegheny County Regional Asset District. Cataloging and scanning of the Teenie Harris Archive is supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Grant to Preserve and Create Access to Humanities Collections.

Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this release or the mentioned exhibitions and programs do not necessarily reflect those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

August Wilson Center for African American Culture
The August Wilson Center for African American Culture preserves, presents, and interprets the art, culture, and history of African Americans in western Pennsylvania and people of African descent throughout the world. The Center realizes its mission through an engaging schedule of visual and performing arts presentations as well as historical, educational, and public programs.

Carnegie Museum of Art
Located at 4400 Forbes Avenue in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh and founded by industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie in 1895, Carnegie Museum of Art, one of the four Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, is nationally and internationally recognized for its distinguished collection of American and European works of art from the 16th century to the present. The Heinz Architectural Center, part of Carnegie Museum of Art, is dedicated to the collection, study, and exhibition of architectural drawings and models. For more information about Carnegie Museum of Art, call 412.622.3131 or visit our web site at www.cmoa.org.