<\/p>\nAdd Preferred Source<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
\u201cI took that image without her consent, which is very much against my collaborative basic image making practice now,\u201d Ross admitted during a phone call with the Chronicle speaking from her home in Berkeley. \u201cI scurried away out of fear that she would disapprove and so it wasn\u2019t until about three months later when my friend told me that they were closing that I actually, I finally went back.\u201d<\/p>\n
Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n
While a student at Yale, where she earned a B.A. in ethics, politics and economics as well as art in 2025, Ross visited Beauty Plus both for her personal needs (braiding hair, gel) and artistic (2,000 bobby pins to fashion a crown for a photographic model). Then, in her final semester, Ross became Beauty Plus\u2019s elegist, its final loving witness.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"\u201cJasmine]()
<\/p>\n
\u201cJasmine Ross: Beauty Plus\u201d on view through May 31 at the Museum of the African Diaspora.<\/p>\n
Francis Baker\/MoAD<\/p>\n
Among the more documentary images, such as Hylton holding a photograph of the Obamas or a shot of ceiling water stains above merchandise shelves, are photographs straight out of the fine arts tradition. Turned three quarters towards the viewer, an elegant mannequin head known as \u201cLady #5\u201d poses like a Renaissance portrait. Her beauty was enhanced by Lisa Harrell, who worked at Beauty Plus all 31 years. Harrell gave each mannequin a necklace and painted lipstick.<\/p>\n
As lovely as the mannequins are, Ross said they \u201cstill have dainty Eurocentric noses and long necks.\u201d Harrell tried to make them more reflective of Black culture,but the skin tones were still \u201cgrayed out.\u201d So Ross took time to \u201cmake it seem more chocolaty to represent the Black community a little bit more accurately,\u201d continuing Harrell\u2019s efforts.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ross spent the spring of 2025 lugging a suitcase containing her 4×5 camera, a 10- to 20-pound apparatus complete with old-timey bellows requiring hand-loaded film, to Beauty Plus. Each shot made with the camera required up to 30 minutes of set-up. Ross sees that time as a way of avoiding the \u201cextractive process,\u201d the exploitative non-consensual practices unfortunately common in the history of photography.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n
\u201cThe time that Jasmine is taking to produce those films actually mimics the time-based nature of community building,\u201d said Lee. \u201cIt also mimics the intimacy required to sustain Black life under pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"The]()
<\/p>\n
The 4\u00d75 camera Jasmine Ross used for \u201cBeauty Plus.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jasmine Ross<\/p>\n
Lee\u2019s observation echoes Ross\u2019 own articulation of her practice.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy goal will never be to simply document what something looked like, but what it felt like to be there, moving through that space, and inhabiting that identity,\u201d Ross explained. \u201cEspecially when thinking about Black life, where lived experience has historically been dismissed or distorted, I see this more holistic approach and understanding of what truth can be as a way to reclaim narrative authority.\u201d<\/p>\n
That ethos is embodied in Hylton, who Ross describes as\u201cone of those neighborhood aunties who you could go to the beauty supply store and just talk to for hours. \u2026 She was very much a community builder.\u201d<\/p>\n
Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n
![\"\u201cNo]()
<\/p>\n
\u201cNo Returns\/Life\u2019s Work\u201d by Jasmine Ross<\/p>\n
Jasmine Ross<\/p>\n
The 2020 census<\/a> counted the Black population of San Francisco at 5.1%. Last month the Castro Theatre hosted a sold-out screening of the 2019 film \u201cThe Last Black Man in San Francisco,\u201d but Black businesses continue to face pressure. In recent years prominent Black-owned businesses including 1300 Fillmore, All Good Bakery, Brown Sugar Kitchen and Red Bay Coffee\u2019s flagship caf\u00e9 have closed.\u00a0<\/p>\n\u201cWe have to have these microcosms of care if we\u2019re ever going to be able to face the larger systems of exclusion,\u201d said Lee.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When Ross graduated, Hylton and her husband Rudolph, aka Rudy, whom Ross calls \u201cfictive kin,\u201d gave her a card with $100. They later shipped the blue boombox that appears in \u201cMs. Purple\u201d to MoAD.<\/p>\n
Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n
In the gallery, photographs of Hylton in her shop listening to the radio\u00a0\u2014 antenna still wrapped with tin foil\u00a0\u2014 are displayed. They appear among the mannequin heads decorated by Harrell\u2019s paintbrush and worn at the crowns from people removing and replacing wigs for 31 years. Here, the gift of Beauty Plus lives on.<\/p>\n
Letha Ch\u2019ien is a freelance writer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cJasmine Ross: Beauty Plus\u201d on view through May 31 at the Museum of the African Diaspora. Francis Baker\/MoAD…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302005,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[329,65739,143,145,144,101],"class_list":["post-302004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-arts-and-entertainment","tag-arts-and-exhibits","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news","tag-san-francisco"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302004\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302005"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}