Carla Williams, Side, from the series  How to Read Character, 1990, printed 2024; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Accessions Committee purchase, by exchange, through a gift of Michael D. Abrams; © Carla Williams
Talk

Artist Talk: Carla Williams

Related Exhibition (Re)Constructing History

Saturday, Apr 4, 2026

2 p.m.

Floor 1, Phyllis Wattis Theater

This program has tiered pricing. Please select the option that works for you:
$0 — Free RSVP
$10 — General
$20 — Extra Support
$30 — Pay It Forward

An Official SFMOMA scavenger Hunt Stamp

Join us for an artist talk with Carla Williams in conjunction with (Re)Constructing History, an exhibition that embraces the possibility for photographs to both record an instant and capture history embedded within the present. Borrowing its title from artist Carrie Mae Weems’s featured series, Constructing History, this installation invites audiences to imagine the layers of history we encounter through a seemingly fixed image.

In this conversation, Williams will reflect on self-portraiture, the materiality of photographic collages, and the evolving meaning of revisiting one’s own archive. Her work moves beyond static documentation, offering deeply personal photographs that expand how we understand beauty, pleasure, authorship, and the power of seeing oneself fully — within and against the broader sweep of history.