Hear a description of this artwork.

TRANSCRIPT:
Sand-blasted text on glass reading “DESCENDING THE THRONE YOU BECAME FOOT SOLDIER & COOK” is etched over a monochromatic, red-tinted, circular portrait in a dark, charcoal-colored frame. The portrait is that of an aged Black man with a bushy, white beard and moustache thickly covering his upper lip, chin, cheeks, and extending up to both temples. He wears a floppy, cowboy-style hat, brim folded upward, and a jacket adorned with bows and buttons pinned to the sleeves and lapels. 

Made by the artist Carrie Mae Weems in 1995, the work measures about 2.5 feet tall by 2 feet wide and is part of a larger series titled "From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried". Weems used a specific archival record as her primary source material: daguerreotypes taken in 1850 of Drana, Jack, Renty, and Delia, enslaved Africans. The purpose of these “portraits,” which were commissioned by Swiss naturalist and Harvard University professor Louis Agassiz, was to capture and classify “physiogamatic types,” or body differences, in order to support racist theories of Black inferiority. 

For this work, Weems made a number of interventions to the original archival image retrieved from Harvard’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. She enlarged the image, tinted it, and cropped the red-toned print with a dark-charcoal circular mat and matching frame. Her choice of etched words hovering over the photograph, “DESCENDING THE THRONE YOU BECAME FOOT SOLDIER & COOK,” narrate the subjection implicit in the making of this image. Through these strategies, Weems challenges the perceived objectivity of the original photograph she sourced and restores a level of humanity and dignity.

Installation view, "Off the Record", Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, April 2– September 27, 2021. Photo: David Heald

Off the Record

Exhibition Website

Desc. of Descending the Throne You Became Foot Soldier & Cook, 1995

The audio tour for John Chamberlain: Choices shares perspectives on select key works from the exhibition.
www.guggenheim.org/chamberlain

John Chamberlain's Involvement with Abstract Expressionism

As part of the Guggenheim Museum’s Summer of Know series, artist Ad Minoliti and activist Adam Werner discussed social and artistic responsibility, and building community on digital platforms, with moderation by X Zhu-Nowell, Assistant Curator at the Guggenheim Museum.

Photo: Ed Marshall

Archivo de la Memoria Trans
https://archivodelamemoriatrans.tumblr.com/

Queer Ancestors Project
https://www.queerancestorsproject.org/

The Feminist School of Painting
http://fschool.kadist.org/

Cromoactivismo
https://www.facebook.com/Cromoactivismo-1430319627007557/

Campaña Nacional por el Derecho al Aborto Legal Seguro y Gratuito
http://www.abortolegal.com.ar/

Summer of Know

Conversation: Ad Minoliti and Adam Werner (2019)

Listen to audio about exhibitions and artworks at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City. Frank Lloyd Wright's landmark building is home to a collection of modern and contemporary masterpieces.

Desc. of Descending the Throne You Became Foot Soldier & Cook, 1995

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

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