Carrie Mae Weems

the long version

Carrie Mae Weems brings together for the first time five of this American photographer's most recent groups of work: the Sea Islands Series (1991-92), the Africa Series (1993), From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried (1995-96), Who What When Where (1998), and Ritual & Revolution (1998). These series, which rely mostly on photography and include other media such as sculpture, are powerful expressions of Weems's provocative, complex, and often humorous social observations. The themes that have dominated Weems's work over the course of her twenty-year career - identity, race, gender, class, the legacy of slavery, the African diaspora - are all highlighted here. An artist and a cultural critic, she has sought not only to criticize, but also to confront the viewer and provoke a change in attitudes.