This exhibition of photographs and related works, largely from The New School Art Collection, focuses on race and social justice. Photographs make up 30% of the collection, with many of these works made in the late 1980s and early 90s, a period in which some artists used the documentary form of photography and related mediums to develop powerful portraits of themselves and their communities, while others highlighted the violence done to such communities. Photography itself has an important evidentiary role to play in capturing the complexities attendant to social change: it has long been used to document social injustice, and spurred resistance. The exhibition features artists such as Wendy Ewald, Lyle Ashton Harris, Rashid Johnson, Glenn Ligon, Lorna Simpson, Carrie Mae Weems, and others. Additionally, artists and Parsons alumni Sable Elyse Smith and American Artist extend the dialogue through their work, which continues the preoccupations with racial invisibility and documentary evidence.

Curated by Macushla Robinson

Macushla Robinson is an alumna of The New School Liberal Studies department (class of 2017) and is currently pursuing her PhD in The New School’s Politics Program.

This exhibition’s title is drawn from Claudia Rankine’s 2014 book Citizen.