Our Mothers’ Gardens is a series uncovering repressed images of Black women held in photographic collections at the Art Institute of Chicago. The images often depict exploitation and violence towards Black women, whether overt or obscured. With these images, Pernell has excavated, re-photographed, re-captioned and re-contextualized the original works to show them in a different light with new meaning. Pernell has reimagined the work and draws attention to how, historically, Black identity has been erased and how this impacts the mental well-being of Black Americans.

Alayna N. Pernell is an interdisciplinary artist, researcher and educator from Heflin, Alabama. In May 2019 she received a B.A. in Studio Art with a concentration in Photography and a minor in African American Studies from The University of Alabama She received her M.F.A. in Photography from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2021.

Related Artist Gallery Talk:
Join us for a Free Gallery Talk with artist Alayna N. Pernell, Friday, February 10, 2023 at 11 a.m.