The colors are bold. They grab you. They capture the power and essence of the people wrapped in them.
Jason Hill creates superheroes. In My Skin, his series of portraits that exemplify this, are on display at A.N. Bush Gallery in the Bush Barn in the Salem Art Association’s Bush Barn Art Center until Dec. 22. With each image he creates a mythos that hints at the subject’s origin stories.
Growing up, Hill said, he loved sci-fi movies, especially Star Wars, but he only saw himself reflected in the face of Lando Calrissian, played by Billy Dee Williams. Now he creates his own heroes.
“With this you are in the presence of superheroes,” Hill said of the series.
With each portrait he gives the viewer a sneak peek at the subject’s superpower. He says he doesn’t know what those powers are, but it is easy to read the force behind those images. Their vibrant life, accomplishments and fortitude are on display for all to see.
This series, Hill said, embraces the Afrofuturism art movement. Afrofuturism explores the identity, history, ancestry and experiences of the African diaspora through science fiction and fantasy genres. Much of his art is centered in the New Color Movement and shares similarities with the work of The Netherlands photographer Richard Terborg.
The project began as a simple album-cover photo shoot for his friend, AfroPop musician I$$A.
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“He called and said, ‘Hey, I have this song and I want you to shoot the LP cover and I want the community to be involved. I just put out a call,’” Hill said.
The title of the series is a play off the title of I$$A’s song “Pigments in My Skin.” This nod to the song adds another layer to the complexity of the series, according to Hill.
The timeframe of the photo shoot added to its intensity and hyperrealism.
“It was a weird time. It was during Covid, and the fires and George Floyd had just died. It was really fun and cool, but it really got out of control.”
The first call for models was overwhelmingly answered, and it turned into a celebration of life on the edge.
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“Anybody who showed up was in it,” said Hill. This resulted in at least 80 people crowding his studio, lingering and embracing community.
I$$A, too, is captured. He is framed against a golden canvas bathed in a band of red light. He screams at the camera in the image on display in Salem.
Later Hill issued a second call for female models to balance the number of male participants.
Hill eventually selected 60 favorites from the photo shoot, some of which he printed to show at the AUX/MUTE gallery at the Portland Art Museum from November 2021 through February 2022.
The work was all in camera and in studio. There was little post-processing. Using the color wheel, backdrops and light gels, he created images that enshrine the subjects. The unique makeup styles were chosen by the models, many of whom have direct African roots, according to Hill.
“It means something to them,” he said of their makeup choices.
With this series he has captured the stories and the lives of the local African American community, which he describes as small and tight knit.
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While much of Hill’s work is centered in color theory, he also shoots traditional portraits using more subdued color. These images are more reminiscent of Richard Avedon’s, whose style was often stark and poignant, hinting at deeper joys and traumas.
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His series Favorite Things includes not only his signature dynamic color portraits, it also includes these traditional portraits as well. A selection from this collection of traditional images, Favorite Things II, is on display in Salem until June 29, 2025, at the Waldo Bogle Gallery in the Bush House Museum. And several bold color images from the series hang at the entrance into the A.N. Bush Gallery.
Even in the more sedate images Hill is sharing origin stories, and in this case he is sharing the raw, vulnerable stories of what means the most, what is precious, to his subjects and whether these are happy, sad, joyous or full of mischief is for the viewer to decide.
“I love the stories. I’m really liking the history,” he said.
In one of the traditional portraits from the Favorite Things series, Jonny Cool, also known as Jonny Sanders, a local musician and friend, stares into the camera challenging and disarming the viewer.
While a bold color image, Favorite Things of Jonny is one of the images hanging outside the entrance to the A.N. Bush Gallery. There he holds an album from 1970, a rare copy of the funk LP Gangsters. Both his father and uncle played on it. It’s part of his origin story.
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Another traditional image from Favorite Things shows Paul Knauls, colloquially known as The Mayor of Northeast Portland, sitting, dapper and full of excellence, in his natty suit, radiating happiness. He owned the Cotton Club, a jazz bar that was located in Northeast Portland and named after the famous bar in Harlem, New York. His is another story captured by Hill’s lens.
Hill continues to expand his storytelling methods.
“I dabble in film. I am always looking for different ways to tell stories.”
He has created a short documentary film series in black and white about the local artists he’s captured for his Favorite Things photo series. He is hoping to expand it into a full-length documentary.
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A companion show of Favorite Things is on exhibit at Portland Center Stage in the Ellyn Bye Studio lobby through Jan. 5, 2025. The show includes the short documentary series on the artists who appear in the portraits.
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For more information about Jason Hill and his work, visit his website at jasonhillphoto.com or on Instagram @jasonhill.photo.
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The Salem Art Association Bush Barn Art Center & Annex and the Bush House Museum are at 600 Mission St. S.E., Salem, 97302. For more information, call (503) 581-2228 or visit their website at salemart.org.
Dee Moore is a queer freelance journalist and artist whose personal work focuses on gender identity and explores the dynamics of gender expression and what gender means. She grew up in Beaumont, Texas, where she longed to be a boy. She studied journalism and art at Lamar University in Beaumont, and now lives in the Salem area, where she works, sculpts and shoots. She was an artist in residence at the Salem Art Association Bush Barn Annex, where she took studio portraits of members of Salem’s LGBTQIA community who often fear getting professional photos taken because of prejudice and bigotry. She has exhibited work at Bush Barn Annex, Prisms Gallery, and The Space. Dee is genderfluid (this is one word) and bisexual. Her pronouns are she/her or they/them. Find more of her work at cameraobscuraimages.com.
