Double Negative
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Object Details
Artist/Maker
Lorna Simpson, American, born 1960
Date
1990
Medium
Four dye diffusion color Polaroid prints and three plastic plaques
Dimensions
Please contact the Museum for more information
Credit
Purchase with funds from the National Endowment for the Arts and Edith G. and Philip A. Rhodes
Accession #
1990.69 a-g
Image Copyright
© Lorna Simpson, courtesy of the artist and Hauser & Wirth.
Description
Conceptual artist Lorna Simpson’s work derives its gut-punching power from the evocative, allusive, and deeply unsettling combination of words and images. Here, four stacked photographs of a braided hair piece are accompanied by text panels that slide down from “not” to “noose,” along the way invoking related words (including “knot”) to effect a devastating slippage between the loop of the hair and the loop of a noose. The title Double Negative refers not only to the repeated negative phrases (“not”) but also to the double and entwined burdens of racism and sexism that Black women endure.