“If you have a platform that people listen to, you have to use it to try and force change” – Misan Harriman
Misan Harriman made history by being the first black male to photograph the cover of British Vogue in its entire 104-year history. He founded a digital publishing company, What We See which reaches an average of 172 million people a month in 37 countries. Guest Correspondent, TUNDUN ABIOLA talks to the Nigeria-born and UK-based multi-hyphenate, photographer- content creator- content curator- cultural commentator about his work, his business, his family and why black lives matter. He talks about authenticity and how innate proficiencies; interests and traits form the building blocks for the formidable career he was born to have.
You’re in Sweden with your family now, you have your camera with you. Who or what are you shooting?
I’m shooting those that I love. That’s how I really learnt how to capture somebody’s essence and understand what to look for in my composition. When you’re shooting someone that is your world and your heart, there’s an intimacy you learn to pull out of an image that hopefully, I can replicate when I’m shooting other people.
You took an unconventional path into photography. You didn’t take courses or work as an assistant. How did you learn the techniques?
I’m pretty dyslexic and I’m incredibly visual in how my brain receives information. I watched a lot of tutorials on YouTube that teach you how to choose a camera, about shutter speed and understanding light. Anybody can go to YouTube. Any time I didn’t understand something, I found someone who had posted how they had fixed the same problem online. Then I got out there and started shooting. There’s only so much anyone can teach you about becoming a photographer. You’ll learn your skills “on the road”.
How did your Vogue cover come about? Who made the call and how did you react? It must be gratifying to not only have made history but to have made it your way.
The opportunity came about because of my anti-racist Black Lives Matter reportage photography that I had been shooting over the last three months. Those images went viral very quickly. Everyone from Martin Luther King’s son to Lewis Hamilton, the Mayor of London, Diddy, Sarah Jessica Parker all used these images to make statements about racism. Millions of people saw them and Edward Enninful, the Editor in Chief of British Vogue was shown these images. As a black man who has had the same experience as all of us, the images resonated with him very deeply. He posted some on his personal Instagram account and posted a few articles online. A few months later, I had a zoom call with the senior management of British Vogue and Edward. In his humble and very sweet way he just said, “I would like you to shoot the cover your way and how you like to do photography”. I did everything during the call to focus and not collapse or pass out!
I know the Vogue magazine and I know the importance of the September issue. It would have been extraordinary to get a cover but to have the September issue at this moment is beyond my wildest dreams. It’s a great example of how to use power.
Edward is the most powerful man in the fashion industry right now but he wields it with so much empathy. He has empowered me to now have a platform where hopefully, I can lift others up and that’s something I do not take lightly and will definitely try and emulate.
What are your thoughts on fashion going political?
We have no choice right now. We’re talking about our lives and our babies’ lives. It’s the biggest stain on modern man. If you have a platform that people listen to, you have to use it to try and force change. Edward has experienced racism, so the cultural significance of this moment was everyone finally coming together to fight this thing. We never even thought it would happen.
That’s why the response to this issue has been so overwhelmingly positive. We needed to see a marquee, iconic brand saying, “We’re with you and we’re fighting alongside you to get rid of this awful thing that should never have existed anyway.
I’ve cried when I get videos of kids from working class backgrounds that have never even heard of Vogue who are taking their pocket money and going to Co- Op or wherever to buy that issue because it makes them feel that they matter.
Do you think there’s been a shift towards racial equality?
What happened in our parents’ and grandparents’ generation is that they could never mobilize properly because they didn’t have one thing and that’s the internet. The death of George Floyd was seen online, and it was like lighting a tinder box. We now know that there are enough of us that are against this horrible thing and there is no going back. That’s why I believe there is a change. When I was out in the protests, the biggest civil rights movement that the UK has ever seen. I saw 9/10-year olds boys and girls who were reading about the history of civil rights and racism. That gave me so much hope because I know that they don’t ever want to repeat the history that has been hidden from them. That’s when you know you’ll have real change when this generation knows what happened. They haven’t had some revisionist version of history like I had at school. They have empathy in their hearts, and they want to force change. That is as important as people who are in their 40s like me fighting for it. What I’ve seen in London has been hope and solidarity between people from all walks of life. That’s unexpected because in the London I grew up in, to have five thousand people of all races saying, “We’re fighting for people that look like you, Misan” has never happened before.
