The Debt Project

September 15, 2020
A photographic exhibit of the many faces of American debt. In a book version of an online photo series that Powell began a few months after she filed for bankruptcy in 2012, the author collects raw imagery from a group of 99 contributors, across 17 states, diversified by racial, geographical, and educational backgrounds yet unified by the onerous experience of debt. For each of them, debt is a harsh and constant reality; many cite the common denominators of student loan debt, health care costs and lack of insurance, economic downturn, and sudden job loss as primary causes. The photos and accompanying personal testimonies--rendered in handwritten notes, a choice that makes the words feel immediate and urgent--work together to disarm the shame associated with debt. Pictured in cluttered studio apartments and makeshift corner offices, the profiles range widely across professions: hairstylists, teachers, architects, artists, entrepreneurs, professors, and the executive director of a cannabis cooperative who accumulated more than $900,000 of debt after a federal tax audit and a 10-day stay in the intensive care unit after a brain aneurysm (he had no health insurance). The most heartbreaking profiles are those of nonprofit or care workers who make daily sacrifices for others while their personal finances suffer. For the most part, Powell allows her photographs to speak for themselves, illustrating the strife faced by many who pursued their dreams only to end up faced with insurmountable financial obligations. As one contributor laments, "I wake up everyday [sic] and try to be a person. To afford to be a person. Who feels like me. I am trying on empty." Given the diversity of circumstances as well as levels of debt, this artistic project will resonate with any American who faces debt and any of the other injustices involved with income inequality. A moving, humanitarian expos� on the isolation and despair of financial hardship.

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