In 2014, Carrie Mae Weems was the first Black artist to have a retrospective at the Guggenheim. The show centered around Weems’s photography, and included her 1990 “Kitchen Table Series.” Aptly named, it’s a series of images of her family at table, photographed in black and white, every day, under the same pallid white light. Two years ago, Weems presented her epic film installation The Shape of Things at another seminal New York institution—the Park Avenue Armory. Street memories, peep shows, and a 19th-century carnival coexist in her projections, which tell a funny yet wry story of American life. Both of these monumental exhibits are now on view at London’s Barbican Center. This is Weems’s largest U.K. retrospective so far. —Elena Clavarino