is an Atlanta-based artist/cultural worker using photography to document the social, political and cultural experiences of the African-American community.
(photo credit: julie yarbrough)
2019 ArtsXchange Award
Sistagraphy 25 exhibit "Sisters in the Struggle"
5 Photographers Honored By
Georgia Legislature!
February 19, 2013
Rep. Roger Bruce and the Georgia House of Representatives honored 5 photographers during Black History Month: Jim Alexander, Arthur 'Bud' Smith. Horace Henry, Clyde Bradley and ME! I was selected to address the GA House on behalf of the group. What an honor for the little black girl who attended segregated schools in Atlanta to be honored by and speak to the Georgia Legislature. Truly humbled and honored!
Also see my RECENT ACTIVITIES on the Galleries page.
2018 Elevate SWATS Mural
I am Susan J Ross, also know as “Sue” and as the PhotoGriot. For the past 40 years, I have been documenting the cultural, political and social stories in our community.
I am the daughter of Dr Hubert Ross, an anthropologist, and Edyth L Ross, a social work professor, and have one brother Michael. My parents both taught at The Atlanta University. I grew up in Atlanta during the Civil Rights Movement, attending a segregated elementary school and participating in the desegregation of Atlanta high schools. My higher education was at Pomona College, Atlanta University and Stanford University.
I grew up in an incredible time of social and political change and was fortunate to be able to meet and work with some of the finest minds of our time. I participated in the transition of political power, first by working in the political campaigns of Mayor Maynard Jackson and Congressman Andrew Young while a student. After Andrew Young was elected Mayor, I went into city government for over 36 years - through the administrations of all six Atlanta African-American Mayors.
I held a variety of positions at the City - most revolving around minority & female business development and/or communications/media relations. For the last decade of my career in public administration, I developed and managed the Small Business Development Program - training over 500 small, minority & female owned firms to improve their internal infrastructure & to do business with the city. I served as the unofficial & sometimes official city photographer, although I always held a full time managerial position.
Photography has been my passion. I consider myself a participant-observer/documentary photographer/ cultural activist over the past 40 or so years. I have documented many Atlanta cultural events, including the Atlanta Jazz Festivals, the National Black Arts Festivals, the 1996 Olympics & Paralympics, the Atlanta visits of Nelson Mandela, the Hammonds House Museum and the events of many civil rights organizations such as The King Center, the Institute of the Black World, SCLC, SCLC WOMEN and at the Atlanta University Center.
I am a founding member of Sistagraphy, the collective of African-American women photographers, which recently celebrated our 25th Anniversary. I have exhibited widely and my photography appears in several books, such as Reflections in Black: A History of African-American Photographers, The Atlanta Jazz Festival: 40 Years, and MFON: Women Photographers of the African Diaspora.
My work is in the collections of The Museum of Contemporary Art in Georgia, the Clark Atlanta University Galleries, Spelman College and many private collections. My photographs are is published in books and magazines and I am one of the featured artists in the Elevate Atlanta SWATS Artists Mural in Southwest Atlanta.
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Sue Ross has combined her lifeswork with her positions in government administration for the City of Atlanta, serving as photographer for many Atlanta events including the annual Dream Jamborees, the 1988 Democratic Convention, the Atlanta Third World Film Festivals, the Atlanta Jazz Festivals, the Nelson Mandela visits, King Week, the National Black Arts Festivals, the Centennial Olympic Games and Paralympic Games, and as the informal, and sometimes formal, chronicler of activities during the administrations of Atlanta’s five African-American mayors. Currently, she serves as vendor development manager for the City of Atlanta Department of Watershed Management.
Sue has exhibited through the city since 1985, including the Atlanta Life Insurance annual Afro-American Artists competitions, the National Arts Program Atlanta Municipal Employees exhibitions, Spelman College, City Gallery East, the Hammonds House Galleries, Atlanta Photography Gallery, the APEX Museum, Frames ‘n’ Fine Art Gallery, M’Print Gallery, the Ellis-Chambers Gallery, Changing the Face of Creativity, the Arts Exchange, Atlanta-Fulton Public Library, Rush Art Gallery (NYC), Auburn Avenue Research Library, Native Sun Gallery, Paradigm Artspace, Cleveland State University African-American Cultural Center, Salem College Fine Arts Center Gallery, Georgia Perimeter College, the Center for Aids and Humanity, Studioplex, Art Farm, One Night Stand, the Michael C. Carlos Museum, City Gallery Chastain, Mason-Murer Gallery, the Rialto Center for the Performing Arts, Georgia State University and Alabama State Univerity. Sue’s first solo exhibition, Jazz Atlanta Style, was exhibited at the Gilbert House as part of the 1999 Atlanta Jazz Festival and at the Southwest Arts Center (2005). Recent solo exhibitions include In a Mellotone: Portraits in Jazz at the Rialto Center for the Performing Arts (2007), Sheroes at the Douglass Theatre in Macon (2008) and Sankofa: Looking Back to Move Forward; National Black Arts Festival 1988-2010 at the Rialto Center for the Performing Arts (2011). Her portraits of Pearl Primus and Maya Angelou were included in the Fay Gold Selects show at APG. Her work was selected for the Atlanta Master Photographers exhibit at Kennesaw State University, the Reflections in Black exhibit at the Atlanta History Center and Civil Rights and Social Justice at Alabama State University.
Her work appears regularly in local and national publications. She served as the photo editor and principal photographer for the City’s weekly newspaper City Beat from 1996-2001, and later as principal photographer for the e-newsletter, City Newsbytes (2004).
Her photographs have appeared in numerous books, including In the Eye of the Muses: Selections from the Clark Atlanta University Galleries; Generations, Present Tense Past Perfect: 20th Anniversary of the National Black Arts Festival; Maya Angelou: A Glorious Celebration; Savoring the Salt: the Legacy of Toni Cade Bambara; Posing Beauty, Black: A Celebration of a Culture and Reflections in Black: A History of Black Photographers: 1840 to the Present by Deborah Willis, A Love Supreme by TaRessa and Calvin Stovall, Dr. Richard A. Long’s Black Americana and African Americans, Patricia Bell Scott’s Life Notes and Double Stitch, Andrea Young’s Life Lessons My Mother Taught Me, Andrew Young’s An Easy Burden and the catalogues Dreaming Identities, 30 Years of the Atlanta Jazz Festival and Sistagraphy: A 10 Year Retrospective.
Sue’s portraits of Miles Davis and Pearl Primus are in the permanent collection of Clark Atlanta University Art Galleries. Her work toured in the national exhibit Saturday Night, Sunday Morning, curated by Deborah Willis. Her 2011 solo exhibition "Sankofa: Looking Back to Move Forward" explored the 22 year history of the National Black Arts Festival. Her work was recently featured in ‘Dreaming Identities’ at the Arnika Dawkins Gallery, curated by Dr Deborah Willis, and is currently on display in exhibits at AUC Woodruff Library, Southwest Arts Center and Stonecrest Library.
She is a 2004 recipient of the Paul R. Jones Family Fund’s first national Spiral Award to Artists of Distinction and has been honored for her cultural work by the Trumpet Awards Foundation, Spelman College Digital Moving Image Salon, Rolling Out Magazine Top 25 Women in Atlanta, Who's Who in Black Atlanta,Welcome Magazine MECCA Award, Concerned Black Clergy, the Black Women Film Preservation Project, the Hammonds House Museum, the Center for Democratic Renewal and the Atlanta City Council. Sue is one of 5 photographers honored for their lifelong commitment to documenting African-American life and culture by the Georgia House of Representatives.
Sue is a founding member of Sistagraphy™: the collective of african-american women photographers, a member of MOCA and the Atlanta Photography Group. She serves on the boards of the Black Women Film Network, the BronzeLens Film Festival, the Hammonds House Museum, Nutrition Plus HHC and Sistagraphy. Sue also served for many years on the boards of the National Black Arts Festival, the Atlanta African Film Society and the Metropolitan Atlanta Coalition of 100 Black Women.
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