Maxine Walker’s photographs raise questions about the nature of identity. In this untitled series, Walker challenges racial identity stereotypes as she photographs herself in a variety of guises. Playing on the format of photo-booth photography, Walker’s changing hair and skin colour across the series appear as instant transformations rather than fixed identities. The photographs engage with the politics of black female identity, especially hair.

This series was first exhibited in 1995 as part of the ‘Self-Evident’ exhibition of black photography at the IKON gallery in Birmingham, which also featured a series by photographer Ingrid Pollard. Both series were acquired by the V&A as part of the Staying Power project. Staying Power is a five year partnership between the V&A and Black Cultural Archives. The project aims to explore black British experience from the 1950s to the 1990s through photographs acquired by the V&A and oral histories conducted by Black Cultural Archives.