always a powerful experience to be at any sort of rally or protest in Birmingham knowing that you’re standing on the ground that people fought very hard for civil and human rights.” Roth said while at the protest, the photograph he liked the most was of two young men holding posters and shouting. “It’s an image of hope for me. It’s the next generation participating in something that’s been going on since the beginning of the United States,” he said. John Watson, a freelance photographer and Spain Park High School senior, recalled the morning after the riot in Birmingham, Alabama. He’d gone out to take photos downtown and saw a homeless man sitting near the confederate monument picking up trash from the night before. Jasmine Kennedy, another Birmingham freelancer, said her most memorable moment was during a protest when a little girl held up a sign that said, “Stop killing our dads.” “It was definitely a gut punch,” she said. “To have a feeling of fear of knowing there’s a possibility my guardian will not return to me. It’s a feeling of trust on the ends of law enforcement surrounding our future.” From these moments that create lumps in throats and butterflies in stomachs, photographers are left with photos that linger long after the moment passes. More importantly, they recognize each moment’s historical implications. According to USA Today, there have been more than 1,700 protests in the United States across all fifty states. “Just seeing the scale of things has been really different for me,” Wang said. She said she had seen protests in Austin before, but none with the momentum of the current movement. She described how the protests occupied multiple locations and somehow seemed to flow as one. “I’ve been really amazed at how global it has become,” Gerlach said. She said she was working on an article for UGA’s newspaper that compared images of the protests in Athens, Georgia now to prior years: 2012, 2014 and 2016. Gerlach said in prior years the protests seemed to have a max of a hundred people who were primarily Black. After looking at photos from last weekend’s protest, she saw a diverse group of over 2,000 people. “It’s been really cool to see how large the movement has become and how widespread it is,” Gerlach said. “It’s like so many more people are waking up to the reality of the world we live in and [are] willing to fight for something, which is cool.” Hoppe expressed his amazement at the Black Lives Matter protests emerging in places like Uganda, Kenya and Bristol. “I don’t remember a movement having this kind of global impact,” he said. “The size of this movement has reached a pitch that I never thought I would see.” “Speaking of the context of history, we are walking in it, you know. It’s a really cool moment to know that you are in the middle of history; there’s nothing like that,” Hoppe said. Every day protestors call for justice, accountability and change, creating historical moments to be captured by photographers who wait on the front lines poised to apprehend the truth and leave it bare for all citizens to assess. “It’s been really cool to be a part of telling the history of this moment,” Gerlach said. “I can see how transformative this moment in history is going to be, so I’m really honored to be on the front lines and be able to have people who will share their stories with me and learn from the source.” [ 53 ]
[Photographer] Alexis Blue [ 54 ]