Leslie Hewitt (American, born 1977)
c-print
30 in. x 24 in. (76.2 cm x 60.96 cm)
Museum Purchase, Collectors’ Collaborative and Funds Contributed by Isaac L. Lagnado, 2012.20. © Courtesy the artist and Perrotin
Riffs on Real Time (8 of 10) is one of a series where visual artist Leslie Hewitt creates layered compositions combining personal iconography, popular print ephemera, and textual surfaces in a photograph. Art critics have described Hewitt’s work as “a postmodern take on the still life,” using found objects and material culture to produce and photograph site-specific installations. While not always readily apparent to the viewer, the photo-sculptural assemblages reflect Hewitt’s interest in the “fragile nature of quotidian life,” often reflecting on the passage of time, memory, and experience. Hewitt gathers the archival material used in her assemblages from African American communities, often taking family photos, maps, magazines, schoolbooks, and literary text. The objects gathered in this collage span time and place but are collapsed into a single photographed moment.