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Drawing on historical and contemporary examples—from Judy Chicago’s Dinner Party and Beyoncé and Jay-Z at the Louvre to images of a black hole— by Alexis Boylan ’94 considers how we engage with and are manipulated by what we see. She begins with what: what is visual culture, and what questions, ideas, and quandaries animate our approach to the visual? She continues with where: where are we allowed to see it, and where do we stand when we look? Then, who: whose bodies have been present or absent from visual culture, and who is allowed to see it? And, finally, when: is the visual detached from time? When do we see what we need to see? (MIT Press, 2020)

Alexis Boylan is an associate professor in the Art and Art History Department and the Africana Studies Institute at the University of Connecticut. She is the author of Ashcan Art, Whiteness, and the Unspectacular Man.