Lightning Bolt: Photographs 1968-2024
January 27 - March 16, 2024

Craven Allen Gallery is proud to present a selection of the best photographs taken over six decades by one of the preeminent photographers of our times, Burk Uzzle. From the fields of Woodstock to the graveside of Martin Luther King Jr., Burk Uzzle has witnessed some of the most important events in recent American history, always with his camera in hand. At age 23 he was the youngest photographer to be hired by LIFE magazine. Uzzle then went on to operate as a member of the prestigious international photo agency, Magnum, founded by his mentor Henri Cartier-Bresson, even serving as its president from 1979-1980.  Burk has refused to let the momentum of his early career stagnate. His current work rests deep in photographic appreciation of the quiet, strong, and eloquent beauty he discovers in America’s small towns and its people. It is along small back roads, limned with feelings and a surety of surprise for the heart wide open, that continue to support his understanding of how America keeps its personality out on a limb.

Highlights of the exhibition include Congregation Ladies, a studio portrait of African American women in their Sunday finery; Desert Prada, a quintessential Uzzle landscape depicting the Elmgreen & Dragset sculptural installation in Marfa, Texas; a selection of his iconic Woodstock photographs, and an important historic suite of twenty gelatin silver prints of the funeral of Martin Luther King, Jr., printed by the artist.

Uzzle’s work has been the subject of several solo museum shows, and his work is in important public and private collections. He is the subject of the acclaimed feature-length documentary F11 and Be There, by filmmaker Jethro Waters.

STATEMENT

Burk married his then wife, Cardy, at age 19. At age 20, they moved to Atlanta where Burk had accepted a position as an assistant to Photographer Jay Leviton.

At his studio I answered a call from Jet Magazine requesting Jay to photograph a young pastor getting much attention, named Martin Luther King Jr. When told Jay was out of town I was asked if I could shoot pictures, to which I answered yes. I was immediately given the assignment and details, the picture had to be made that day. Did the picture - making this my very first magazine assignment! Jet loved the picture, and I was given other magazine work through the photographer's agency, Black Star. After about a year Black Star asked If I would move to Houston, Texas. Cardy, my two sons and I immediately moved there. Spent a busy year there, doing my first Life Magazine assignments. Exactly one year later, age 23, Life Magazine hired me, moved Cardy and my two young sons to Chicago. Then to New York. Worked for Life for six years, then joined Magnum Photos. Next few years were very busy, and I was living near Washington.

Cardy met me at an arriving flight, handed me a bag holding a few rolls of film, and a portable strobe. In the other hand was an airline ticket. She told me Martin Luther King Jr. had just been killed in Memphis, and she knew I would want to be there. The flight to Memphis left in 20 minutes, and she directed me to the flight.

I arrived in Memphis and drove immediately to the Lorraine motel. Took pictures of the officers outside Dr. King’s room, then turned around and made pictures of incredulous people, above which was the building with the window from which the shot was fired that killed King. I then made many other pictures in Memphis.

That first night I slept on the darkroom floor of the local newspaper. Their staff photographer had told me they were expecting a call very early the next morning to be among the very few people allowed to see the body of Dr. King before being flown to Atlanta. The brief time in that room is when the vastly different reactions to his body were photographed. The tender touch picture, I was told later by a member of the MLK world, was given by a mistress.

I took the picture at the airport with arms aloft as the plane holding his body was taking off, bound for Atlanta. I proceeded to make all the pictures of his funeral, except one. I found a bridge vantage point, placed Cardy, a tripod mounted telephoto lens, and she did the pictures of the funeral procession.

Years later, I had an incredible studio in Wilson, NC. I got large neon signs made, one said “I Have A Dream”. That sign figures prominently above my picture with the mistress and her tender touch, with the incredible wall of my studio in the background.

After 17 years in Wilson, I sold my two adjoining buildings in downtown Wilson and now have a home and wonderful studio in Briar Pointe, Morrisville, NC.

-Burk Uzzle