at an arm's length: Expanding the Walls 2025

Fifteen teenage photographers from the Studio Museum's Expanding the Walls program explore cautious intimacy and adolescent reserve through soft-focus and black-and-white imagery.

Why go

This marks the program's twenty-fifth anniversary, centering the photographic archive of James Van Der Zee alongside work by contemporary photographers like Dawoud Bey, LaToya Ruby Frazier, and Carrie Mae Weems—creating an intergenerational dialogue rooted in Harlem's photographic legacy.

What to expect

An online exhibition of digital inkjet prints (16 × 20 in.) by fifteen teen artists, using soft focus and black-and-white techniques to obscure detail and evoke timelessness. The works explore themes of community, intimacy, and adolescence through deliberately resistant, hard-to-read imagery.

Things to know

• Expanding the Walls marks its twenty-fifth anniversary in 2025.
• The program is free and runs eight months, supporting teenage photographers based in New York City.
• Founded in 2001, the program centers the archive of Harlem photographer James Van Der Zee (1886–1983).
• Young artists engage with work by Dawoud Bey, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Texas Isaiah, Ming Smith, and Carrie Mae Weems.
• The exhibition is available online at expandingthewalls.studiomuseum.org.
• Supported by the Keith Haring Foundation Education Fund, Joy of Giving Something, and other major funders.

Plan your visit

This is an online exhibition available at expandingthewalls.studiomuseum.org beginning July 29, 2025. No physical visit required.