These Photos Don't Fade, Either

Once you’ve seen “Hip Hop, 1993” by Earlie Hudnall, Jr., it’s hard to clear it from your brain. Maybe you can forget the glowing, slight-but-strong frame bent in the most “Yeah, what” body language. It’s the hole-boring eyes that know way too much for their age, and the pager clip that means they’ll soon know more. Hip Hop, the young subject of Hudnall’s likely most famous photograph (though, there are many we think deserve equal ranking), is captured as a young kid, and nearly 20 years later, it’s hard not to wonder what became of him. It’s a common response to Hudnall’s photographs. At the same time, Hudnall’s work — whether shot in the neighborhoods of Houston and Galveston, or his hometown of Hattiesburg, Mississippi — has an enduring, spirited quality. Without pagers, striped knee socks or scooters to hint decades, the scenes and characters are anywhere and everywhere. A 25-year-old portrait, “Classic Boy, 1990” is both the kid down the street now, and when you were all of about 9. That quality of Hudnall’s work is one reason it resonates and sticks. See yesterday and today in Hudnall’s studies of neighborhood during an eponymous exhibition 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays at Photographs Do Not Bend Gallery, 1202 Dragon St., through May 9. The exhibition opens with an artist reception 5-8 p.m. Saturday. Admission is free. Visit pdnbgallery.com.
Sat., Feb. 21, 5-8 p.m.; Tuesdays-Saturdays, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Starts: Feb. 21. Continues through May 9, 2015