Tom Rankin photographs and papers, 1977-2016

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Summary

Creator:
Rankin, Tom
Abstract:
Tom Rankin is a documentary photographer, filmmaker, folklorist, professor of art and documentary studies, and former director of the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University. The collection consists of 147 black-and-white and color photographs documenting the American South and China, as well as supporting materials for Rankin's documentary projects. Photographs from the South focus on religious sites, rituals, and communities in the Mississippi Delta region, and includes Southern landscapes as well as portraits of individuals, including Mississippi writer Larry Brown. An additional documentary project from 2016 took Rankin to China, where he photographed semi-rural landscapes, often taken with high-rise buildings in the far distance or adjacent to industrial structures, as well as bridges and rivers, markets and live fish vendors, and a few street scenes. Finished prints range from 8x11 inch contact prints to 11x14, 16x20, and 20x24 large-format prints. Supporting materials include manuscripts, publications files, and two films, all deriving from Rankin's career and documentary practice. Includes a digital audio recording of a talk by Rankin at the exhibit opening of his work, "Near the Cross: Photographs from the Mississippi Delta." Acquired as part of the Archive of Documentary Arts at Duke University.
Extent:
33.5 Linear Feet (28 boxes; 2 film reels)
Physical description:
33.5 linear feet; approximately 13,640 items
Language:
Material in English
Research Center:
Archive of Documentary Arts
Collection ID:
RL.10043

Background

Scope and content:

This collection consists of 147 black-and-white and color photographs by photographer Tom Rankin documenting the American South and China, as well as papers and other materials related to Rankin's projects and career. The Southern photographs were taken from 1980 to 2007, and focus on religious sites, rituals, and communities in the Mississippi Delta region; these prints form the largest series, "Sacred Space." Another body of work features portraits of Mississippi writer Larry Brown. A third body of work, "Portraits from the American South," offers views of Southern people, cultures, and landscapes in both color and black-and-white.

An additional documentary project from 2016 took Rankin to China, where he photographed semi-rural landscapes, often taken with high-rise buildings in the far distance or adjacent to industrial structures, as well as bridges and rivers, markets and live fish vendors, and a few street scenes.

Print sizes range from 11x14, 13x19, 16x20, and 20x24 inches, with many housed in window mats. Along with these prints, there are also 8x11 inch black-and-white matted contact prints. All titles were created by the photographer.

Selected photographs from this collection have been exhibited at the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke and other locations. A selection of Rankin's photographs was published in a book, Sacred Space: Photographs from the Mississippi Delta (1993).

Supporting materials in this collection include a digital audio recording of a talk by Rankin at the exhibit opening of work from the Sacred Space series, "Near the Cross: Photographs from the Mississippi Delta," as well as paper records related to his career and art practice, including book publications and book layouts. Also in the collection are two motion films, Dance Like a River (1985), directed by Barry Dorfeld and Tom Rankin, and Four Women Artists (1977), directed by Bill Ferris.

Acquired as part of the Archive of Documentary Arts at Duke University.

Biographical / historical:

Tom Rankin served as the Director of the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University for three consecutive five-year terms until 2013, and is a Professor of the Practice in the Arts and Director of the Master of Fine Arts program at Duke University. A documentary photographer, filmmaker, writer, editor, and folklorist, he has been documenting and interpreting American culture, particularly in the South, for nearly twenty years. His photographic work has been published and widely exhibited. His most long-standing work has been to reveal through the documentary arts the culture and society of the Mississippi Delta region, where he also served as a faculty member of Delta State University and the University of Mississippi. He has returned many times since the 1980s to photograph the landscapes and people of the Mississippi Delta, most recently in 2011 after the great floods of that year.

His books include Sacred Space: Photographs from the Mississippi Delta (1993), which received the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Award for Photography, 'Deaf Maggie Lee Sayre': Photographs of a River Life(1995), Faulkner's World: The Photographs of Martin J. Dain (1997), and Local Heroes Changing America: Indivisible (2000).

He received an MFA from Georgia State University and an MA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. American Photo Magazine named Tom Rankin as one of the "100 Most Important People in Photography", May, 2005.

Acquisition information:
The Tom Rankin photographs and papers were received by the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book Manuscript Library as gifts and purchases from 2007 to 2018.
Processing information:

Originally processed by Rubenstein Library staff, December 2008

Reprocessed and encoded by Paula Jeannet and Alex Cunningham, February 2017.

Addition of film reels encoded by Craig Breaden, 2017.

2018 addition processed and encoded by Paula Jeannet.

Accession(s) represented in this collection guide: 2007-0028, 2007-0046, 2007-0134, 2008-0021, 2008-0060, 2013-0114, and 2018-0115.

Arrangement:

The photographic materials are arranged in four main series by bodies of work: Larry Brown; Sacred Space: Photographs from the Mississippi Delta; Portraits From the American South; and Photographs from China. These series are followed by Other Photographic Work, Manuscripts and Recordings, and Other Audiovisual Materials.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Contents

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Restrictions:

Original audiovisual materials are closed to use. Use of these materials may require production of listening or viewing copies. Please contact Research Services before coming to use this collection.

Access note. Some materials in this collection are original audiovisual items that need to be reformatted before use. Contact Research Services for access.

Terms of access:

The copyright interests in this collection have not been transferred to Duke University. For more information, consult the copyright section of the Regulations and Procedures of the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library.

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Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Tom Rankin photographs and papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.

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