Sketches from the Shore

Lyle Ashton Harris's work traverses the terrain of complicated gender and racial identity. His semiautobiographical portraits also invoke performance and disguise. From his new series on Ghana and his critique of the shifting concepts of African modernity to his mixed-media installations on masculinity centered on French soccer player Zinedine Zidane and his deeply intriguing self-reincarnations, Harris fearlessly confronts his own personal narrative and forces all who interact with his imagery to rethink and reimagine what it means to be both black and American, male and female, alien as well as citizen.