Refract’s fourth volume explores the entanglements between the document and the documentary as sources of information and forms of visual culture. Derived from the Latin docere (to instruct, to teach), the document can be a pedagogical tool, a disciplinary measure, or a literary and legal form that ascribes value to people and property and gives shape to cultural beliefs called laws. And yet, the document defies boundaries—it is at once literary, sociological, scientific, and historical while also being a material object with affective qualities.
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Amalia Mesa-Bains and the Archive: An Interview with the Artist
Amalia Mesa-Bains and Madison Treece

Review of An-My Lê: On Contested Terrain
Rachel Klipa

I’m New Here: Black and Indigenous Media Ecologies: Curatorial Statement
Tao Leigh Goffe and Tatiana Esh

Ground Maps of an Unknown Prospect
Elpitha Tsoutsounakis

Jozi Rhapsody: Tracing a City’s Legacy through Time
Ncomi Nzimande

Documenting Gender’s Signs: Site, Performance, and the US-Mexico Border in Contemporary Art
Margeret Allen Crocker
VOICES OF VISUAL STUDIES