Deana Lawson
ICA Boston, MA
November 4, 2021 – February 27, 2022
Installation view, Deana Lawson, ICA/Boston, 2021. Photo by Mel Taing.
This exhibition is the first museum survey dedicated to the work of Deana Lawson (b. 1979 in Rochester, NY), a singular voice in photography today. For more than 15 years, Lawson has been investigating and challenging conventional representations of Black life through a wide spectrum of photographic languages, including the family album, studio portraiture, staged tableaux, documentary pictures, and appropriated images. Engaging acquaintances as well as strangers she meets on the street, Lawson meticulously poses her subjects in highly staged photographs that picture narratives of family, love, and desire, and create what the artist describes as “a mirror of everyday life, but also a projection of what I want to happen. It’s about setting a different standard of values and saying that everyday Black lives, everyday experiences, are beautiful, and powerful, and intelligent.”
For more information on Deana Lawson at ICA Boston, click here.