When we think of motorcycle clubs, we tend to think of the Hells Angels or the Outlaws, but we don’t typically picture Black men being members of these groups.
Alanna Airitam, a self-taught photographer, is revealing the untold stories of these Black “one-percenter” motorcyclists in her exhibition Alanna Airitam: Black Diamonds, on display now at Tucson’s Etherton Gallery, 340 S. Convent Ave.
The exhibition, running through June 22, features 15 portraits that highlight chapter members from the motorcycle club Chosen Few in Tucson, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Long Beach and the San Fernando Valley.
“This club, Chosen Few, is the first multiracial or integrated motorcycle club,” Airitam said. She said the club started as a group of Black men who wanted to build a brotherhood and a place to work on their bikes and ride safely across the country.
Airitam says she was inspired by the club’s history with photographer Danny Lyon, who worked with Chosen Few member Clifford “Soney” Vaughs as part of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee during the Civil Rights era. Lyon photographed Soney being lifted, shirtless and shoeless, by six National Guardsmen in Cambridge, Maryland, at a civil rights demonstration, according to The Vintagent.
“(Vaughs) designed the bikes for (the movie) ‘Easy Rider.’ I look at these histories in these stories and it’s interesting to me that we don’t know a lot about where certain things come from,” Airitam said. “These are motorcycles made by a Black man, but you don’t know that.”
Airitam says that one of her first subjects, Nomad President Boss Mike, became a prominent figure in her work before his passing in January. His portrait is the first piece visitors see when they walk through the doors at Etherton Gallery. Boss Mike stands wearing his Chosen Few vest behind his gleaming, custom chopper motorcycle.
“It’s a whole art piece, and you can look in there and see all the details,” Airitam said. “This is an art form that seems to be largely lost in a lot of the newer members.”
Airitam says she would have conversations with Boss Mike about how the club started and how it has changed over the years. She says she tried to capture some of those changes in her portraits of the younger generation of bikers.
Alanna Airitam, a self-taught photographer, is revealing the untold stories of Black "one-percenter" motorcyclists in her exhibition Alanna Airitam: Black Diamonds.
Black Diamonds is not the first project Airitam has done highlighting untold stories from Black history. Her first body of work, “The Golden Age,” is about the absence of her community being featured in the western art canon.
“We were around in the 17th century and we were not all servants and enslaved,” Airitam said. “So, where are we? I felt the need to tell that story.”
Leaning into her gift
Since her first exhibition in 2017, Airitam has showcased about eight bodies of work “at esteemed institutions such as the Center for Creative Photography, the New Orleans Museum of Art and the Rhode Island School of Design Museum,” according to her website. While grateful and proud of her accomplishments, Airitam says that she has struggled with feelings of guilt and self-doubt.
“I thought about all the people that I knew that went to school and studied so hard and had a vision for their careers, and I just made this body of work and got lucky,” Airitam said. “That’s how I saw it, and that did something to me.”
Airitam said she would often put pressure on herself by thinking about her lack of credentials or wondering what she did to deserve opportunities that other artists struggled to reach. She said she’s only begun to come out of a spiral of imposter syndrome in the last year.
“I realized that this is just the thing that I have to do in the world,” she said. “This is a gift and a tool that I’ve been given, and I’m ready to lean into that.”
In April, Etherton Gallery took Airitam’s work to the AIPAD Photography Show held annually in New York.
“It was kind of a big deal to put it out there in front of about 15,000 people,” said gallery owner and director Terry Etherton.
Another big deal: Airitam’s work being published in the French international magazine “Apocalypse Magazine.”
In April, Etherton Gallery took Airitam's work to the AIPAD Photography Show held annually in New York.
Etherton Gallery is the first gallery to exhibit Part 1 of “Black Diamonds.” From opening night in April, with Harleys out front and vested bikers carrying in cases of beer, to now, Etherton says the exhibition has been a massive success.
“We’ve never had an opening night like that before, and it could not have gone better,” Etherton said. “It’s been unbelievable, really.”
Gallery manager and head registrar Shannon Smith says visitors have taken an extensive liking to Airitam’s work. “Everybody loves it,” Smith said. “It’s powerful, it’s bold, it’s commanding.”
Airitam says she plans to photograph members from Outcast MC and East Bay Dragons MC for the next few years to complete the final two parts of “Black Diamonds.” She hopes to have the three parts in book form once she wraps the project.
“The histories are so rich and so important,” Airitam said. “Its connection to where we’ve come from and where we are going is important, and I want to write about that.”
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