ABSTRACT
This chapter considers how religious commitments, specifically the ethic of reciprocity summarized by the Golden Rule, might provide a framework for viewers’ reception of contemporary art. Carrie Mae Weems’ photographic installation From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried (1995–1996) serves as both a case study and a model for the ways that contemporary art can powerfully shape viewers’ perception of others. Weems utilizes and challenges the Archive, a concept identified and critiqued by scholars to describe the ways that artworks and images coalesce to shape cultural expectations of honor and derision. She illuminates the Archive’s limitations while also expanding it to more fully encompass the texture and diversity of humanity. Finally, her concluding text, “And I Cried,” resonates with the Judeo-Christian practice of lament as an act of relationship. A viewer’s commitment to an ethic of reciprocity can thus engender a new way of looking at art: a loving regard.
