Jean Genet ’s 1959 play, THE BLACKS, uses the framework of a play within a play, to expose racial prejudice and stereotypes while exploring black identity. It was the longest-running Off-Broadway non-musical of the 60s and was photographed by Hugh Bell. More than a dozen photos by Hugh Bell of this seminal production have been catalogued by GME as we review hundreds of additional images by this important figure in contemporary photography.

Cicely Tyson, James Earl Jones, Roscoe Lee Brown, Ethel Ayler, Cynthia Belgrave in the blacks at the St. Mark’s Playhouse in 1961.

Hugh Bell was a renowned art and commercial photographer, who worked in New York City over the course of his entire professional career. In 2014 GME was engaged on an exclusive basis by the Bell Estate to manage the collection of Hugh Bell’s photographs and to further the artist’s legacy. GME is committed to resurrecting the career of this overlooked photographer, through licensing of his photographs, republishing his out-of-print books, mounting curated exhibitions, and in identifying a long-term repository for this significant collection of photographic works.

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In Recognition of Juneteenth GME Presents Hugh Bell's Photographs of Jean Genet’s Play THE BLACKS at the St. Mark’s Playhouse in 1961