A new exhibit, "We Hold These Truths: American Veterans of Arkansas," at Mosaic Templars Cultural Center by Little Rock photographer Ed Drew, opens at 7 p.m. Thursday with a livestream virtual event on the center's Facebook page.
The exhibit features about 30 5-by-7-inch tintype photographs and some cyanotypes printed from silver gelatin glass plate negatives of Black veterans who are current or former residents of Arkansas. Drew titles each photograph with the subject's first name and last initial.
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There are also typed versions of letters from Arkansas Confederate soldiers originally written during the Civil War included in the exhibit.
Drew, a native New Yorker who served in Afghanistan with the California Air National Guard and is an Air Force Reserve technical sergeant at Little Rock Air Force Base, is using his photographs to tell the stories of Black veterans.
"As a Black veteran, I feel a duty to my country and to work extra hard to prove that I deserve to be a citizen," he says. "Black veterans have fought since the beginning of this country, but it seems like we have always had to prove that we deserved to be here and deserved the rights of this country."
His photography is a way to include Black veterans in the story of America, he says.
There are, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures mentioned on the museum's website, about 207,000 veterans living in Arkansas. Approximately 23,000 are Black.
"I want to change the narrative of this country to be more inclusive. It's not about propping up Black people, it's about including us. If you see me as a human before you see me as anything else, perhaps we can come together."
Drew has exhibited tintype photos he took of his fellow airmen in Afghanistan — the first tintypes taken in a combat zone since the Civil War — and his work is in the Smithsonian National Museum of American History's permanent collection.
The process of photographing the veterans included in "We Hold These Truths" began more than a year ago.
"They are accomplished people," Drew says of his subjects. "The are doctors, judges, lawyers ... It was really nice to see that spectrum of accomplishment that went beyond the military."
Beyond Thursday's livestream, in which Drew will speak about the work, the exhibit will be up at the cultural center through February. The center, at 501 W. Ninth St., is open 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday. Admission is free. For information, visit mosaictemplarscenter.com