Uploaded April 2017 | Updated September 2026, 6 hours ago
For Freedoms, co-founded by Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman, is the first artist-run Super PAC using art to inspire deeper political engagement for citizens who want to have a greater impact on the American political landscape. Thomas is a photo-conceptual artist working primarily with themes related to identity, history, and popular culture who has exhibited throughout the U.S. and abroad. His work can be found in numerous public collections including The Museum of Modern Art New York, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The Brooklyn Museum, The High Museum of Art, and the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. Thomas’ co-founder Gottesman photographs, writes, makes videos, teaches, and uses art as a vehicle to engage people in critical conversations about the social structures that surround them and him. Gottesman is currently a Visiting Associate Professor in Film, Photography, and Video at Hampshire College, a Visiting Professor at Addis Ababa University School of Fine Arts, and a Mentor in the Arab Documentary Photography Project. His work is in various collections including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The For Freedoms team is rounded out by photographer Wyatt Gallery; nonprofit arts organization strategic planning and development consultant Dena Muller; art historian and business consultant Michelle Woo; and Joeonna Bellorado-Samuels, a Director at the Jack Shainman Gallery.
For Freedoms, co-founded by Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman, is the first artist-run Super PAC using art to inspire deeper political engagement for citizens who want to have a greater impact on the American political landscape. Thomas is a photo-conceptual artist working primarily with themes related to identity, history, and popular culture who has exhibited throughout the U.S. and abroad. His work can be found in numerous public collections including The Museum of Modern Art New York, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The Brooklyn Museum, The High Museum of Art, and the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. Thomas’ co-founder Gottesman photographs, writes, makes videos, teaches, and uses art as a vehicle to engage people in critical conversations about the social structures that surround them and him. Gottesman is currently a Visiting Associate Professor in Film, Photography, and Video at Hampshire College, a Visiting Professor at Addis Ababa University School of Fine Arts, and a Mentor in the Arab Documentary Photography Project. His work is in various collections including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The For Freedoms team is rounded out by photographer Wyatt Gallery; nonprofit arts organization strategic planning and development consultant Dena Muller; art historian and business consultant Michelle Woo; and Joeonna Bellorado-Samuels, a Director at the Jack Shainman Gallery.




![2023 Infinity Award: Critical Writing, Research, and Theory—Ariella Aïsha Azoulay
The International Center of Photography’s Infinity Awards honor outstanding achievements in photography and visual arts. In 2023, we recognize artists working in photojournalism, contemporary photography, new media, and critical writing, research, and theory. All proceeds from the Infinity Awards directly benefit ICP’s education and exhibition programs, providing critical funding for the entire institution.
Ariella Aïsha Azoulay is Professor of Modern Culture and Media and Comparative Literature at Brown University, a film essayist, and curator of archives and exhibitions.
Her books include: Potential History – Unlearning Imperialism (Verso, 2019); Civil Imagination: The Political Ontology of Photography (Verso, 2012); The Civil Contract of Photography (Zone Books, 2008); From Palestine to Israel: A Photographic Record of Destruction and State Formation, 1947-1950, (Pluto Press, 2011).
Her potential histories, archives and curatorial work include: The Natural History of Rape (Berlin Biennale, 2022); Errata (Tapiès Foundation, 2019, HKW, Berlin, 2020), Enough! The Natural Violence of New World Order, (F/Stop photography festival, Leipzig, 2016), Act of State 1967-2007 – Israeli Regime of Occupation 1967-2007, (Centre Pompidou, 2016, Arquivo Municipal de Lisboa Fotografico, 2020); The Body Politic [in Really Useful Knowledge, curated by What, How & for Whom / WHW], Reina Sofia, Madrid; Potential History of Palestine (2012, Stuk / Artefact, Louven), Untaken Photographs (2010, Igor Zabel Award, The Moderna galerija, Lubliana; Zochrot, Tel Aviv).
Among her film-essays: The world like a Jewel in the Hand – Unlearning Imperial Plunder II (2022); Un-documented: Undoing Imperial Plunder (2019); Civil Alliances, Palestine, 47-48 (2012); I Also Dwell Among Your Own People: Conversations with Azmi Bishara (2004) & The Food Chain (2004). 2023 Infinity Award: Critical Writing, Research, and Theory—Ariella Aïsha Azoulay](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/tB1XKB__wTI/mqdefault.jpg)


![Crown Graphic Camera & Weegee
We take a look at this amazing Crown Graphic camera that one of our visitors brought by ICP! Used by Weegee (whose work is on view now) back in the day to make his images on the streets of NYC, this hefty camera is no joke.
Our visitor Mary was kind enough to sit down with us in the ICP library and show off the camera.
Image: Unidentified Photographer, [Weegee with his Speed Graphic camera], ca. 1944. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (2200.1993.a) / Unidentified Photographer, [Weegee with his camera], ca. 1951. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (20379.1993) / Weegee, Simply Add Boiling Water, December 18, 1943. Purchase, with funds provided by Lois and Bruce Zenkel Purchase Fund, 1982 (150.1982) Crown Graphic Camera & Weegee](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/u6f98t6YhQE/mqdefault.jpg)


