FOR SOME ARTISTS, being embraced by the art world after years spent toiling in relative obscurity would be the ultimate vindication. But for Lorraine O’Grady, acceptance was never the goal. O’Grady, who passed away on December 13 at the age of 90, was much more interested in getting people to think—and see—differently. Her work took a wide variety of forms, including performances, installations, interventions, collages, and objects, and it often dealt with the different ways that women (and women of color, specifically) were marginalized or otherwise excluded from different spaces and narratives, particularly in art. She even created characters out of whole cloth, like Mlle Bourgeoise Noire (Miss Black Middle Class), whom she famously introduced to the world in 1981 by crashing an opening at New York’s New Museum, dressed…
