From Braids to Business
April 2025 | Site: Cea'Mone Beauty's Shop
Cameron 'Cece' Jefferson is a community-driven entrepreneur who has long advocated for Black and brown people to have more access to hair care options in Princeton, New Jersey. During the beginning of the pandemic, after beauty supply stores and other businesses closed, she decided to launch her own business. Cea’Mone Beauty, a local home-based beauty supply shop, sells hair and beauty essentials, with the goal of helping Black and brown people fall in love with their hair. This collection, featured in my article, captures Cece's shop.
A Day in Philly
March 2025 | Site: Cherry Street Pier
Liberation is Our Mission
April-May 2024 | Site: Princeton University
This collection features photos from the Popular University for Gaza, the community of students, professors, activists, local residents, and others at Princeton University standing for the liberation of the Palestinian people in Gaza—to fight against Israel’s occupation of Gaza for many decades and the escalated genocide on tens of thousands of Palestinian people since October 7, 2023.
In April of 2024, the encampment started. People showed up to express their solidarity with Palestinians and the collective fight against apartheid, ethnic cleansing, racism, genocide, and colonialism. The message to Princeton was clear: disclose and divest. Day in and day out, we chanted, marched, protested, prayed, sang, watched informative films, listened to guests and community members speak words to stir us up and remind us why we were there, and stood together. Much happened, but the encampment and the community stood strong. Since the encampment started, Princeton University became increasingly more dismissive and flat-out violent, in language and practice. The encampment was forced to shut down from Cannon Green on May 15, but the movement remained alive. And the Popular University for Gaza has since started back up during the 2024-2025 school year. This genocide is still ongoing—this encampment is a part of the larger movement against genocide.
Liberation is our mission!
Utah Rocks
July 2024 | Site: Moab, Utah
This collection showcases the vast red rocks in the city of Moab, Utah. On a 2,500-mile road trip across the U.S., my family and I rode from New Jersey to Utah, through scenic routes and popular landmarks, to make memories both during the drive and at our destination. During the moment captured in this collection, on the side of this narrow stretch in the middle of Moab, Utah, astonished by the view, we pulled over, stepped out of the car, and looked in awe at the gorgeous display of rocks visible from every direction.
Black (i)n White (Spaces)
December 2021 | Site: Princeton University
This collection speaks to the experience of Black students at a PWI, and, in this case, specifically an Ivy League university.
From the outset, Princeton University has been deeply tied to racism, exclusion, and white supremacy. The campus sits on the homelands of the Lenni-Lenape peoples, who are Indigenous to the Northeast region. Also, 16 out of the institution’s 23 founding trustees were enslavers. Today, many of the campus buildings are named after these racist white men---including Stanhope Hall, shown in this collection, which was named after racist enslaver Samuel Stanhope Smith. Stanhope Hall still stands on Princeton's campus today and formerly housed the African American Studies department.
Princeton is not the only institution built on racism, however the university has a unique reach and impact, considering that it is known as the number one university in the United States and one of the most prestigious universities in the world due to its research contributions.
While Princeton now claims a commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion, much more work needs to be done. There needs to be institutional change rather than surface-level solutions. And increasing diversity is not the same as working toward anti-racism, exclusion, or decolonization. Read more about Princeton's "efforts" here.
Black (i)n White (Spaces) tells the story of being Black at Princeton University, a white institution. The title Black (i)n White (Spaces) is a reorientation and redefinition of the term "Black and White," referencing these photographs' black and white color.
Artwork and Design Credits.