Dawoud Bey, Theresa, South Shore High School, 2003, Chromogenic print, Courtesy of the artist, Rhona Hoffman Gallery, and Gorney Bravin + Lee

Interview Excerpt

Audio: (1.7MB mp3 file; 1 minute 6 seconds)

A lot of people ask me, ask me how old I am and they will sometimes, they will say 10. And I'm like, I'm not 10, I'm 15! And... it doesn't hurt or anything, it just... I feel that God is giving it to me, for a reason. Maybe he, he doesn't want me to look my exact age. Maybe he wants me to be unique and different from other people.

Well, I try to think of, like, a happy thing. Like sometimes I watch the news—I try to watch the news every day. And then I watch 60 Minutes with my father, and so I hear about different things around the world, and I also listen to Andy Rooney. Yeah... he seems sort of funny... 'Cause, uh, I remember one thing he was talking about—opening medicine. He was saying that, um, trying to open a medicine, he said that it's children proof, but it's adult proof too because it's hard to open the capsule. And the reason that I'm saying this is because it's hard for a female to open up on what they'll be, or what they are. And for me, for what I am, it's sort of hard because I face, like, you face discrimination... They see... males see you, um, they see you weaker than they are. And they say, you can't do this, you can't do that, and I know I over... I can overcome that because I believe in myself. And nobody can put me down.