Lorraine O’Grady: Family Gained

The Museum of Fine Arts is helping a Boston-born octogenarian artist keep it in the family with its latest exhibit, Lorraine O’Grady: Family Gained. Celebrating the recent acquisition of Miscegenated Family Album—a photo installation of 16 cibachrome diptychs—the collection explores O’Grady’s roots through visual comparisons of her family members with that of Queen Nefertiti of Egypt. The artist, who graduated from Boston Latin and Wellesley College, began exploring the familial history of Nefertiti during a trip to Egypt after the death of her older sister, Devonia Evangeline. While there, she noticed visual similarities between the ancient family and her own, as shown in Sisters IV (seen above) featuring mirroring black-and-white photographs of a young Lorraine beside an image of a sculpture depicting Nefertiti’s sister, Mutnedjmet. Unearth the past at the Museum of Fine Arts through Dec. 2. / Julia Aparicio