Drake, Carolyn

American, b. 1971

BiographyCarolyn Drake makes durational photo-based projects that examine dominant historical narratives about community, identity, and culture. In tandem with her ongoing interest in societally entrenched binaries, her engagement with other mediums such as sewing, sculpture, and collage further collapse the traditional divide between author and subject. For example, One thousand and four Americans were killed by police officers in 2019 (2020), in the Museum of Contemporary Photography permanent collection, is a quilt made from deconstructed police uniforms. Although she does not include specific names of individuals, the repetition of 1,004 fabric squares relays the magnitude of the number of victims and suggests the relative anonymity of both the shooters and victims. By destroying and recontextualizing such an institutional symbol, Drake undermines its power.

Carolyn Drake studied media and culture at Brown University (1994). She lived and worked in New York as an interactive designer before she began taking photographs at the age of 30. Between 2007 and 2013, Drake travelled across central Asia and China, working on two long term projects—Two Rivers (2013) and Wild Pigeon (2014)— that explored the connections between ecology, culture, and political power. Carolyn Drake has received a number of awards and grants, including a Fulbright Fellowship (2006); Lange-Taylor Prize (2008); Pulitzer Center Grant (2009); Guggenheim Fellowship (2010); and many others. Her work has been exhibited by Houston Center for Photography; Pitts Rivers Museum, Oxford; Henri Cartier-Bresson Foundation, Paris; and more. She is in the permanent collections of Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.