Ming Smith: Wind Chime

Visitors will experience Smith’s reflective approach throughout the galleries. The works on display also expand beyond photography. The centerpiece, a multimedia commission that animates a series of photographs using projection, marks an entirely new direction in her practice. Also on view are recent collages and color photographs—all set to an ambient soundscape created by Smith’s son, Mingus Murray.

The exhibition also includes nearly 30 photographs from Smith’s Africa series, taken during her travels to Senegal, Ethiopia, Ivory Coast, and Egypt over the span of three decades. The series began in 1972 on Smith’s first trip to Africa, when she traveled to Dakar, Senegal, on a modeling assignment. The expansive series of photography documents everyday scenes from across the continent as they happened and shares a narrative of the places she visited from her perspective as a Black woman. As Smith has stated: “I was affected by the spirituality of the people. Somehow it seemed that our cultures are very different, but we are very much connected.”

Ming Smith: Wind Chime is part of the FotoFocus Biennial: backstories. Learn more about the program and related events.

This exhibition is part of a simultaneous presentation of work by Ming Smith, also at the Columbus Museum of Art and The Gund at Kenyon College.