If art was no longer your day job what would you be doing?

Lying on the beach & using social media to instigate insurrection for change.

What figure in history would easily represent your alter ego?

Harriet Tubman

What movie can you watch over and over again?

Daughters of the Dust

What do you ultimately want to be remembered for?

Capturing the beauty, history & culture of our people through photography to inform and inspire the next generation.

Favorite childhood candy?
M&Ms – like us, multi-hued on the surface, but pure chocolate inside!

Susan J “Sue” Ross
IG & Twitter: @Photogriot
Facebook: www.Facebook.com/suejross — www.photogriot.com

Susan J. “Sue” Ross is a “photo-griot” with a specialization in documenting images which portray the comings and goings of the African-American community – cultural, political, social and economic. In the African tradition, the griot is the oral historian holding the essence of African history and culture through the word. Sue Ross, the photo-griot, uses photographs to tell the stories of the African-American community.“I am primarily a people photographer, finding grace and dignity in the faces of our people.”

Sue Ross has combined her lifeswork with her positions in government administration for the City of Atlanta, serving as photographer for many Atlanta events including the annual Dream Jamborees, the 1988 Democratic Convention, the Atlanta Third World Film Festivals, the Atlanta Jazz Festivals, the Nelson Mandela visits, King Week, the National Black Arts Festivals, the Centennial Olympic Games and Paralympic Games, and as the informal, and sometimes formal, chronicler of activities during the administrations of Atlanta’s five African-American mayors. Currently, she serves as vendor development manager for the City of Atlanta Department of Watershed Management.

Sue has exhibited through the city since 1985, including the Atlanta Life Insurance annual Afro-American Artists competitions, the National Arts Program Atlanta Municipal Employees exhibitions, Spelman College, City Gallery East, the Hammonds House Galleries, Atlanta Photography Gallery, the APEX Museum, Frames ‘n’ Fine Art Gallery, M’Print Gallery, the Ellis-Chambers Gallery, Changing the Face of Creativity, the Arts Exchange, Atlanta-Fulton Public Library, Rush Art Gallery (NYC), Auburn Avenue Research Library, Native Sun Gallery, Paradigm Artspace, Cleveland State University African-American Cultural Center, Salem College Fine Arts Center Gallery, Georgia Perimeter College, the Center for Aids and Humanity, Studioplex, Art Farm, One Night Stand, the Michael C. Carlos Museum, City Gallery Chastain, Mason-Murer Gallery, the Rialto Center for the Performing Arts, Georgia State University and Alabama State Univerity. Sue’s first solo exhibition, Jazz Atlanta Style, was exhibited at the Gilbert House as part of the 1999 Atlanta Jazz Festival and at the Southwest Arts Center (2005). Recent solo exhibitions include In a Mellotone: Portraits in Jazz at the Rialto Center for the Performing Arts (2007), Sheroes at the Douglass Theatre in Macon (2008) and Sankofa: Looking Back to Move Forward; National Black Arts Festival 1988-2010 at the Rialto Center for the Performing Arts (2011). Her portraits of Pearl Primus and Maya Angelou were included in the Fay Gold Selects show at APG. Her work was selected for the Atlanta Master Photographers exhibit at Kennesaw State University, the Reflections in Black exhibit at the Atlanta History Center and Civil Rights and Social Justice at Alabama State University.

Her work appears regularly in local and national publications. She served as the photo editor and principal photographer for the City’s weekly newspaper City Beat from 1996-2001, and later as principal photographer for the e-newsletter, City Newsbytes (2004).