Akeem Smith: No Gyal Can Test, the first major solo presentation of artist, creative director, and stylist Akeem Smith. No Gyal Can Test is a deeply personal project that investigates the slippages between memory, archive, and history, and, in turn, the weight of visibility and representation. The exhibition focuses on the artist’s experience growing up between New York and Jamaica from the 1990s to the early 2000s amidst Kingston’s thriving dancehall scene. Over the past decade, Smith has assembled an ever-growing archive, at the heart of which is an extensive trove of photographs and VHS video tapes, entrusted to him by family, friends, and key figures from the dancehall scene. Photography by Tiffany Garnett.
