Red Emma’s

Devin Allen first rose to fame in 2015, when his photograph of the Baltimore uprising that followed the death of Freddie Gray at the hands of police was published on the cover of Time magazine. Since then Allen has continued to photograph the fight for social justice in his hometown of Baltimore, creating work that is not only a tribute to Black resistance but also a celebration of his community. Demonstrating his deep commitment and unwavering pride, his decade-long body of work serves as more than documentation—it confronts myths and brings into view what has been made invisible. Central to much of Allen’s work is a reconsideration of Black representation. His photographs, many of them created collaboratively with his subjects, serve as a call for self-realization that allows for complexity, tension and contradiction.

This book, awarded the Gordon Parks Foundation / Steidl Book Prize, includes more than 100 of Allen’s photographs, spanning 2015–2023, many of them never published before. Conceived as a personal narrative about what Allen has called “the texture of us,” the book encompasses formal portraits, images of protests and street scenes. These images are presented alongside texts by Darnell L. Moore, Salamishah Tillet, and D. Watkins that provide insight into Allen’s process and situate his work within the history of Baltimore.

Devin Allen is a self-taught artist who gained national attention when his photograph of the Baltimore Uprising was published on the cover of TIME in May 2015. A native of Baltimore, Devin achieved a rare feat as only the third amateur photographer TIME selected to feature on its cover. In 2017, he was named the first fellow of the Gordon Parks Foundation Fellowship and was nominated for an NAACP Image Award as a debut author for his book, A Beautiful Ghetto (Haymarket Books). Devin was chosen to serve as a 2020 Ambassador for Leica Camera AG; and following the untimely deaths of George Floyd, Tony McDade, and Breonna Taylor, TIME once again acknowledged and honored Devin’s artistry by selecting one of his images from a Black Trans Lives Matter protest to grace the cover of their June 2020 issue. Devin’s powerful imagery of Black life has been featured in New York Magazine, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Aperture. His photography is also featured in permanent collections at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History & Culture, the Reginald F. Lewis Museum, the Jule Collins Smith Museum, and The Studio Museum in Harlem.

D. Watkins is the New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of The Beast Side, The Cook Up, Where Tomorrows Aren’t Promised, and We Speak for Ourselves—which was Enoch Pratt Free Library’s 2020 One Book Baltimore selection. His most recent book is Black Boy Smile: A Memoir in Moments. Watkins is Editor-at-Large for Salon. He is a writer on the HBO mini-series We Own This City and hosts the show’s companion podcast. Additionally, he was featured in the HBO documentary, The Slow Hustle. His work has been published in the New York Times, Esquire, New York Times Magazine, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, and other publications. Watkins is a college lecturer at the University of Baltimore, where he earned an MFA in Creative Writing. He also holds a Master of Education degree from Johns Hopkins University.  Some of Watkins' awards include the Johns Hopkins Distinguished Alumnus Award, the BMe Genius Grant for Dynamic Black Leaders, the City Lit Dambach Award for Service to the Literary Arts, the Maryland Library Association’s William Wilson Maryland Author Award, and Ford’s Men of Courage Award for Black Male Storytellers. He was also a finalist for a 2016 Hurston Wright Legacy Award, and The Cook Up was a 2017 Books for a Better Life finalist.  He lives in Baltimore, MD with his wife and daughter.