Judy: He was a contemporary
American painter who made
pioneering contributions to
black portraiture.
Our special correspondent in
Boston takes us to an exhibit at
his work at Brandeis university
and shows us how he used the
camera as his mechanical
sketchbook.
Reporter: He was a renowned
painter.
Personality uses here -- even
after his death in 4017.
The discovery of his photographs
reveal how much he saw with his
camera.
>> The way an artist would
sketch in the sketchbook to
remind himself of what he saw.
He called the camera his
mechanical sketchbook.
Reporter: That is the name given
to this show at Brandeis
university.
>> His way of painting makes
people jump off the canvas and
the dazzle you.
The photographs also have that
mesmerizing, riveting presence.
Reporter: From his earliest days
growing up in north
Philadelphia, he walks the city
with a camera around his neck.
It was during his travels in
Europe when he saw and
photographed work that would
change his life.
Paintings by the old masters.
>> He knew his art history
really well.
In this self-portrait, when you
see the way he is dressed in the
way he gestures, you have you
really think of Alaska's --
Velazquez.
The hub becomes a comic smear.
-- Convex mirror.
Reporter: He found the museum
paintings riveting for their
beauty and striking for their
lack of blackness.
>> He decided his role would be
to bring his people and friends
and family reporter: Reporter:.
He also turned the gaze on
himself in self trips.
>> Of course all of the tropes
of the hypersexuality of black
men and what that means.
>> You see him playing with
visibility and invisibility in
these various ways.
I think it is very important for
us to think about how black and
brown people are viewed.
Reporter: She is talking about
this photograph in which he
proudly wears a banner of
Superman just as he disappears
behind sunglasses.
All while nude from the waist
down.
>> Part of the revelation of
what he is doing in photography
is we get to see the world
through his eyes.
He does not get pushed to the
side.
Reporter: He bristled at
assumptions, especially when his
work was labeled political.
What did he have to contend with
when people used that word over
and over again?
>> I think people often used the
word as a way to dismiss his
work as doing only one thing.
What he was really doing was
showing the deep complexity of
the people he saw around him.
And the nation he lived in.
Reporter: A nation where he saw
Anita hill fashioned as a
pariah.
Where space was made for the Ku
klux Klan and the confederate
was embraced.
>> He is building in these
contrasts radius images of
confederate flags, trying to
understand the political
tensions in the U.S.
But I also notice in this image,
a man and woman dancing.
The colors in it are the colors
of the pan-african flag.
Reporter: He seemed to revel in
life's pleasures.
The portability of musical play
and the boxes.
All science you are worded as
the beauty in life.
>> There is a lot of sensuality
in the beauty that he portrays.
That brings to mind the portrait
of vendetta.
She is nude and sitting in a
lotus position.
She forms angles.
Reporter: Not to mention a
mechanism like the mechanical
special -- sketchbook for seeing
the world with the widest