In her Museum Series (2005 – present), Weems photographs herself standing outside major cultural institutions and museums with her back facing the camera. The work at once exposes the police killings of unarmed black people while paying tribute to them. In the video work People of a Darker Hue Weems continues to explore this painful reality. In All the Boys (Blocked) Weems emphasises this tragic reality by pairing police reports next to these blurred portraits. The works respond to the police killings of black people in America, bringing urgent attention to the “systematic, brutal authority of the state that is systematically directed against black bodies”.2 While Weems uses the same technique of blurring figures, as curator Courtney Taylor notes, these blurred figures are not recognisable individuals and are “unmoored from any reference beyond our own imaginings”.3 Despite there being no signs that these figures are dangerous, due to the underlying racist imagining in America their presence alone conjures criminality. These motifs extend to Weems’ All the Boys (Profile) and All the Boys (Blocked) series (2016). In Blue Notes and Color Real and Imagined Weems additionally obscures the faces of these blurred figures with blocks of colour, creating a visual metaphor for people “living behind walls of color that block us from knowing who they are, from accessing them, from equity, from equal rights”.1

The blurring of these images references this fact, highlighting the struggle of black women to remain visible within a society that sidelines them. The works feature blurred images of women of colour who have not received due recognition for their artistic and social contributions. Works from Weems’ Slow Fade to Black (2009-10) and Blue Notes (2014) series along with her photograph titled Color Real and Imagined (2014) consider the ways in which perception is shaped by socially constructed collective memory. In this regard Weems reflects on history in order to engage with the present and question where we might be going. Over Time present several bodies of work, which look at these themes in relation to how the past comes to bear on the present. Throughout her career Weems’ works have compelled viewers to actively consider how the world is structured, revealing systems of oppression and inequality while exploring the relationships between power, class, race and gender. Goodman Gallery is pleased to present Over Time, Carrie Mae Weems’ first solo exhibition with the gallery.

Carrie mae williams