Black Power, Black Panthers focus of North Gate photo exhibit

Berkeley - Five decades after the founding of the Black Panther Party, an exhibit of two dozen photos taken from the front lines of the history-making, activist organization rooted in the San Francisco Bay Area opens Wednesday, Oct. 19, at the University of California, Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism. The 'Power to the People: The World of the Black Panthers? exhibit in the Reva and David Logan Gallery of Documentary Photography at North Gate Hall stirs memories of the Black Power movement for those who remember it, and instruction for those who don't. It also offers a bracing backdrop to current national dialogue and tensions around race as seen in reactions to the Black Lives Matter movement, protests following fatal police shootings of black men and boys, San Francisco 49ers? quarterback Colin Kaepernick's refusal to stand for the National Anthem, and more. Ken Light, the journalism school's Reva and David Logan Professor of Photojournalism, said the photos by Stephen Shames 'bring history alive and show the power of photography to record and share the Black Panthers' social consciousness with generations that have only heard about them.