Selections from Asphalt and Chalk

The Jerome Project (Asphalt and Chalk) V, XV, and XVI represent a compelling new phase of Kaphar’s Jerome Project, which investigates racial injustice through the vagaries of the justice and penal systems in contemporary American society. In 2011, Kaphar began researching his father Jerome’s prison record, and came across mugshots of nearly one hundred men who shared his father’s name.

Using their mugshots, Kaphar created layered portraits of multiple Jeromes. Taken together, these works serve both as individual portraits and as composite images in which individual identity becomes blurred, confused, and ultimately illegible.