It seems like we have just entered this drugstore—a few staff members and customers have raised their eyes, but everyone else is engaged in their own activity and conversation. The racially diverse crowd is striking in a segregated era before activists staged sit-ins at soda-fountain and lunch counters.

Van Der Zee photographed the people, streets, and businesses of Harlem for almost 60 years. Throughout his career he attempted to present his subjects in “a position that showed them to the most advantage,” a canny business decision as well as a way to resist the racist caricatures of Black people that circulated widely throughout the country. He was known for creative studio portraiture, using combination printing and retouching to create theatrical images in which, for instance, a bride and groom might be accompanied by a ghostly image of a future child. But he also documented daily life and special occasions, creating an invaluable, decades-long record of a thriving community.

—Text taken from the Carter Handbook (2023)