This month the History Image Gallery will be showing an assortment of photographs taken by Walker Evans. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Evans was part of a well-to-do family. He graduated from Phillips Academy, in Andover, Mass. He studied literature for a year at Williams College before dropping out. After spending a year in Paris, he returned to the United States to join the edgy literary and art crowd in New York City. John Cheever, Hart Crane, and Lincoln Kirstein were among his friends.

Evans took up photography in 1928. In 1933, he photographed in Cuba on assignment for the publisher of Carleton Beals' then-forthcoming book, The Crime of Cuba, photographing the revolt against the dictator Gerardo Machado. In Cuba, Evans briefly knew Ernest Hemingway.

In 1935, Evans spent two months at first on a fixed-term photographic campaign for the Resettlement Administration (RA) in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. From October on, he continued to do photographic work for the RA and later the Farm Security Administration (FSA), primarily in the Southern states and with a tight focus on rural poverty.
 

 Please don't forget that in addition to our monthly shows we have a room devoted to Portland where we showcase beautiful historical photographs and maps that document the oddity and unique presence that makes our city stand out so brilliantly.