Kevin J Mellis created this photographic series in 2014 using a traditional Large Format View Camera ~ using the historical 19^th century wet plate collodion process to honour Black History Month. His artistic intention is to critically investigate the ongoing systemic marginalization of African descendants that sadly continues worldwide; most notably in the United States. Mellis hand developed each of these images on a thin piece of 3mm black glass to represent the fragility of each of these very unique people and their lives. Just like our human selves, if any of the original images were to break the portrait would be altered, if not lost forever. Mellis intentionally left all the smudges, finger prints, lines and streaks in the image to represent the reality of being a person. The main rational for creating this series was to open up a very difficult dialogue (as a white male) around the importance of cultural intolerance, respect and dignity. Sadly, outright injustices, violence, discrimination and marginalization are very common throughout the world today. Just take a look at the daily news coverage from the United States Presidential race as a very sad example. As a white male artist, Mellis felt it was absolutely necessary to be a part of the conversation to find solutions rather than staying silent and indirectly being a part of the problem. Staying silent IS a very big problem.