One of the most eminent image-makers and social commentators in America, MacArthur Fellow Carrie Mae Weems opens today a major new commission and the largest, most significant exhibition of her multidisciplinary artistic practice in the last decade. Throughout her career, Weems has produced a prolific and complex body of work, pushing the boundaries of photography and blurring the line between art and activism. Her new work, The Shape of Things, builds on the convening of the same name and accompanying public programming that Weems hosted at the Armory during her residency in 2017, using art as a lens to probe the political and social issues of the day. Reflecting the “circus-like” quality of contemporary American political life, Weems conjures a dark setting in the Armory’s Wade Thompson Drill Hall with an exhibition that encompasses the breadth of her artistic output—including new multimedia installations and iconic works from the past decade, as well as a performance series and convening of artists. This timely project, which will be situated in the Drill Hall from December 2 through December 31, 2021, was conceived as a platform for collective investigation and reflection on the complexity of the American experience.
