Carrie Mae Weems

  • Who

    Carrie Mae Weems is an artist and photographer well known for her installations that integrate photography, audio, and text to explore many aspects of current American society. She is a prolific artist who worked in several mediums and broadened her practice to include community involvement. Weems has been developing a complex modern continuing discussion covering themes of culture and identity, sexism, social ideologies, family relationships, and more for over 35 years.

  • What.

    Weems’ works have also included fabric, text, sound, and digital pictures as mediums. Weems understood early in her career that photography had the power to reframe Black cultural mythology while removing negative social stereotypes. With a passion for storytelling and folklore, as well as oral and recorded history, she uses these to investigate facets of modern Black identity, typically presenting the subjects in ordinary social circumstances.

  • Why

    Carrie Mae Weems was influenced by earlier Black photographers who chronicled the Black experience, particularly Roy DeCarava. She started referring to herself as the “image creator.” Weems’ early works were generally accompanied by text and audio recordings and explored personal and familial topics. Weems’ art grew more obviously political as it progressed, continuing to address issues of racism and the Black experience.

In the background

Weems launched her debut photography project, Environmental Profits, in 1978, focusing on living in Portland, Oregon. She began incorporating herself in her photographic compositions in the early 1990s in an effort to produce in the work the parallel impression of being in it and of it. She later referred to this recurring persona as an “alter-ego,” “muse,” and “witness to history” capable of representing both the artist and the audience. Weems has taught photography at a number of universities, including Syracuse University in New York, where she will begin a three-year residence in 2020. She co-founded Social Studies 101 with Deb Willis, Dawoud Bey, and Lonnie Graham.