Ernest Withers (1922-2007) I Am A Man: Photographs by Ernest Withers (Portfolio), 1956-1968 (Boston: Panopticon Press, 1994) the complete portfolio of 10 gelatin silver prints, each signed and editioned '22/35' in pencil on the reverse, in clamshell case as issued, together with printed title, signed in ink, colophon, preface by Tony Decaneas, introduction by Martha Hunt Huie, and printed plate list, all encased in a brown cloth clamshell folio; this work is no. 22 from an edition of 35. the largest 15 x 19 in. (38.1 x 48.3 cm.) sheet 16 x 20 in. (40.6 x 50.8 cm.) or the reverse clamshell folio 28 x 24 x 3 in. (71.1 x 61 x 7.6 cm.) Footnotes: Provenance Panopticon Gallery, Boston, 2007 Private Collection, San Rafael Thence by descent to the present owner in 2021 Literature Let Us March On! Selected Civil Rights Photographs of Ernest C. Withers, 1955-1968 (Boston, 1992), pp. 6, 10, 35, 40, 42, 60, 75, 77 Note Civil rights era photographer Ernest Withers selected the ten prints included in this portfolio, each one a history-defining image taken in the Southern United States in the 1950s and '60s. Not only did he document the 'Little Rock Nine' in 1957 as they attended their first day at an integrated high school in Little Rock, Arkansas, but he also captured Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. being stopped by police at Medgar Evers' funeral in Jackson, Mississippi in 1963. In his home state of Tennessee, Withers took a 1960 portrait of a young Black family with five children who had been evicted from their home for voting and were living in a tent city in Somerville. On March 28, 1968, Withers shot his most well-known photograph, I Am A Man. This powerful group scene documents the strike of Black sanitation workers in Memphis who had convened to protest racially biased, unsafe working conditions that had left two employees dead. Nearly every person holds a picket sign stating 'I Am a Man'. Martin Luther King, Jr. traveled to Memphis to support the strike and delivered his 'I've Been to the Mountaintop' speech to the workers on April 3, the day before his assassination at the Lorraine Hotel. This powerful image captures a scene of peaceful protest, group strength, and human dignity. The present lot marks the first time that the complete I Am A Man portfolio has been offered at auction. Other examples of this portfolio are included in institutional collections, including the Toledo Museum of Art (2003.46A-J), the Birmingham Museum of Art (2006.322.1-10), and the William Benton Museum of Art, University of Connecticut (2006.7.1-10). For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com For further information about this lot please visit the lot listing