{"data":{"id":"11353","type":"artwork","attributes":{"id":11353,"topgoose_id":9890,"portfolio_id":null,"tms_id":11353,"title":"The Fae Richards Photo Archive","display_artist_text":"Zoe Leonard","display_date":"1993–1996","accession_number":"97.51a-dddd","dimensions":"See components","medium":"Gelatin silver prints and chromogenic prints with type-written text on paper","department":"collection","classification":"Photographs","credit_line":"Purchase, with funds from the Contemporary Painting and Sculpture Committee and the Photography Committee","is_virtual":false,"is_portfolio":false,"portfolio_tms_id":null,"portfolio":null,"edition":"2/3 | 2 APs","publication_info":"","description":"\u003cp\u003eZoe Leonard, \u003cem\u003eThe Fae Richards Photo Archive\u003c/em\u003e, 1993–1996. Gelatin silver prints and chromogenic prints with type-written text on paper, see components. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase, with funds from the Contemporary Painting and Sculpture Committee and the Photography Committee 97.51a-dddd. © Zoe Leonard\u003c/p\u003e","object_label":"\u003cp\u003eCreated in collaboration with filmmaker Cheryl Dunye, \u003ci\u003eThe Fae Richards Photo Archive\u003c/i\u003e comprises eighty-two images that document the life story of an imaginary person, a black lesbian actress and blues singer named Fae Richards. Zoe Leonard’s narrative unfolds as a series of photographs that track Richards’s life as a teenager and then as a Hollywood screen star, through the Civil Rights era, when her film career was obstructed by racism, and finally to her old age as a forgotten figure. Each film still, candid shot, family photograph, and publicity picture has been staged and styled for optimal realism, with period-specific clothing, makeup, and lighting. The captions were produced on a vintage typewriter, and many of the images were manipulated to simulate the patina of age. By including a casting list of the women hired to play Richards, Leonard acknowledges the project’s artifice, encouraging the viewer to recognize that she had to create a story that is fictional, but rings true, because the real life counterparts of such stories went undocumented.\u003c/p\u003e","ai_alt_text":"Long angled wall-mounted display case shows multiple black-and-white photographs and documents in a gallery.","alt_text":null,"visual_description":null,"on_view":false,"created_at":"2017-08-30T16:32:12.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-02-06T12:00:26.052-05:00","images":[{"id":102151,"url":"https://whitneymedia.org/assets/artwork/11353/CollBi_View_13_Large.jpg"}]},"relationships":{"artists":{"data":[{"id":"3594","type":"artist"}]}}}}