Group exhibition exploring how photographs both record an instant and capture the history embedded within the present, featuring contemporary Black artists alongside Masumi Hayashi's work examining complicated, painful, and familiar histories.
About the Exhibition
(Re)Constructing History embraces the possibility for photographs to both record an instant and capture the history embedded within the present. Borrowing its title from artist Carrie Mae Weems’s featured series, Constructing History, this installation invites audiences to imagine the layers of history we encounter through a seemingly fixed image.
Across three galleries on Floor 3, photographs explore complicated, painful, and familiar histories. The first gallery examines Wall Street as a symbol of American power through its historic and modern depictions, while the second features artists who rework visual traditions through reference and appropriation. The final gallery considers how photography is uniquely positioned to expose the hidden forces behind changing environments and landmark formation.
Featured Artists
In addition to Carrie Mae Weems, this presentation celebrates contemporary Black artists Nona Faustine, Carla Williams, and Dawoud Bey as anchors in each respective gallery. These artists create works that move beyond static, silent documents, offering imaginative images that reveal stories of Black life previously unseen or unconsidered.
Additional artists featured include:
- Masumi Hayashi
- Cindy Sherman
- Paul Strand
- Alfred Stieglitz
- Rephotographic Survey Project
- Yasumasa Morimura
- Mercedes Dorame
Gallery Organization
Gallery 1: Wall Street and American Power
Historic and modern depictions of Wall Street as a symbol of American economic and political power.
Gallery 2: Reworking Visual Traditions
Artists who engage with historical imagery through reference, appropriation, and reinterpretation.
Gallery 3: Hidden Forces and Landscape Formation
Photography’s unique ability to expose the hidden forces behind changing environments and the formation of landmarks. This gallery includes Masumi Hayashi’s panoramic photo collages examining sites of historical trauma and transformation.
Dr. Masumi Hayashi’s Contribution
Dr. Hayashi’s panoramic photo collages are featured in the third gallery, which explores how photography reveals the hidden forces behind environmental change and landmark formation. Her work documenting Japanese American internment camps, abandoned prisons, and post-industrial landscapes exemplifies photography’s power to preserve memory and expose historical injustice.
Her unique technique—combining around 100 individual photographs into unified, large-scale panoramic collages—creates images that “appear believable at first glance but reveal fragmented, unstable space upon closer inspection.” As Hayashi explained: “The normal two-point vanishing point can have three and four. The concept of a straight line connecting two points becomes a curved line connecting two vanishing points (flat walls become curved walls). Two-dimensional space is remapped, reconstructed.”
Exhibition Details
Dates: October 4, 2025 – May 3, 2026 Location: Floor 3, SFMOMA Admission: Included with general admission Support: Major support provided by the Pritzker Exhibition Fund in Photography
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Entry to this exhibition is included with general admission to SFMOMA.