Andre Bradley uses photography’s power to imagine a social landscape and create an archive of one’s own experiences. Similarly, Kalen Na’il Roach’s work is anchored in the image of his own family and questions how this image is created from both the photographic archive and memory. Also engaged with the history of photography, snapshots of African Americans from the collection of Robert E. Jackson address racial identity through a vernacular and historical lens.
Gabriel García Roman and Ria Brodell highlight stories of queer and transgender communities, both past and present. In Roman’s series Queer Icons, he transmutes his subjects into icons, dovetailing textured collage and photography into one-of-a-kind prints. Brodell’s powerful series Butch Heroes tells the stories of historical figures who were assigned female at birth, had documented relationships with women, and whose gender presentation was more masculine than feminine. Through painted portraits and carefully-researched narrative text, Butch Heroes asserts that queer people have always existed and draws attention to the intense struggles they have faced throughout time.