Jon Henry: Stranger Fruit

Death by police officer

Jon Henry’s series “Stranger Fruit” addresses the murders of black Americans at the hands of the authorities. He began making these photographs with mothers and sons in 2014 as a response to the frighteningly regular deaths of African American men through police violence, with reference to Nina Simone’s rendition of the chilling song “Strange Fruit” (1954). In an interview with BRIC Radio, Jon says: “People aren’t getting lynched any more but they are literally being picked off the streets. Lynching was such a common thing, and now these shootings have become so commonplace that we have become almost numb to it.”  Follow Jon on Instagram @whoisdamaster