Billy E. Barnes (NC, 1931-2018), Two North Carolina Photographs

Lot Details & Additional Photographs

Each a gelatin silver print, both ink signed and dated 1964, the first titled Neck Bones (Wise Owl), with description, signature and date to framing, the second titled May 17, 1964: President Lyndon B. Johnson visits tenant farm family near Rocky Mount, North Carolina, ink dedication to verso of photograph, with description, signature, and date to framing; presented in uniform framing.

Frame dimensions 18 x 22 1/2 in. and 16 x 20 3/4 in.

Billy E. Barnes was a North Carolina photojournalist and documentary photographer whose career focused on recording the lives of people and communities across the state during a period of profound social change. After serving in the Korean War and working for McGraw-Hill publications in New York and Atlanta, he returned to North Carolina in 1964 to become the chief photographer for the North Carolina Fund, where his images documented the realities of poverty, civil rights, education, and community development with empathy and honesty.

Barnes created more than 60,000 photographs between 1959 and 1996, producing an invaluable visual record of North Carolina's people and places. His photographs have appeared in numerous national publications and books, and his archive is preserved in the North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where it continues to serve as an important resource for the study of the state's social and cultural history.

Good estate condition, not examined outside the frame.