Cape Canaveral, Florida by Tseng Kwong Chi, 1985: Chi, a Chinese-American, performs his Chinese identity by taking photos of himself dressed as a Mao type figure, interacting with American landmarks.

Fading Away by Henry Peach Robinson, 1858: Robinson is using composite imagery to create pictorial scenes here. The image looks real because it is a photograph, but its actually highly staged and a composite of multiple photos.

The Mythic Being: Sol’s Drawing #1-5 by Adrian Piper, 1974: In this series Adrian Piper dons the hyper masculine identity of the mythic being. The untruth here is that this appears to be a portrait of a man but it is actually a self portrait of the artist.

Malaika #07 by Lise Sarfati, 2010: Sarfati poses her models, aspring LA actors, in scenes that are meant to capture their experiences. These are based on real feelings, but the actual scenes are creations.

Child with Toy Hand Grenade by Diane Arbus, 1962: This famous Arbus photo seems to show some war traumatized child, but its actually just a kid who wants to get back to playing. Arbus creates a narrative that isn’t actually in front of her.

Spiral Jetty After Robert Smithson by Vik Muniz, 1997: Muniz recreates Robert Smithson’s massive, “Spiral Jetty” as a shoe box sized scene. You can’t tell its a recreation from the photo alone though.

Room #1 by Jerry Uelsmann, 1963: This is a composite image of around 6 different photos, combined to create a surreal, dream like scene

Untitled #355 by Cindy Sherman, 2000: This is a self portrait of the artist who transforms her identity with makeup, becoming a different person in the photograph.

Untitled by Jo Ann Callis, n.d: Callis carefully creates scenes with women that play with feminine identities