dawoud bey & carrie mae weems in dialogue

Blue Notes uses color in ways that stand apart from Weems’ other work. Museum shows Weems standing in front of museums and monuments that were architecturally designed to leave people out, including the Louvre and multiple American monuments, to show how engraved oppression is in society.īlue Notes and Slow Fade to Black both criticize society’s tendency to embrace Black culture’s contributions while erasing and neglecting the roots that they came from. It reflects on Stairways to Heaven, a series of three photos of steps and a poem, which was Weems’ first venture into photographing places of power that have historically ostracized Black people from their circles. Weems paints an immaculate image of what it’s like to be Black in America.Īfrica leads into Museum by analyzing the last reminisces of the slave trade and the places of power that enslaved and segregated people of color. Selections include Kitchen Table, Diana Portraits, Africa, Museum, Blue Notes, Slow Fade to Black, Constructing History, All the Boys and her video People of a Darker Hue. 9, 2021, featuring pieces from as far back as the 90s. The Fraenkel Gallery is showing a collection of her work from Sept. Witness is an exploration of Weems’ works, focusing on history, identity and the structure of power. Art’s parallel to society is exactly what Weems is fighting against, by recreating art with a different focus and creating a more honest narrative. Weems repurposes that art, creates narratives, criticizes architecture and systems of power, and does this all with a purposeful lack of color. For much of time, Black people have been delegated to the background of the historical paintings and pictures that they exist in, and when they are shown, it isn’t to glorify or uplift them. Carrie Mae Weems brings light to the things we don’t see: the people in the background and the structures of power.

Dawoud bey & carrie mae weems in dialogue