Mica Lee Anders | Other Female | Inkjet Print | 2005

Mica Lee Anders
My mother is white, my father is black.  They raised me to see myself as biracial—as having the best of both worlds.  But I received a major shock in my development as a mixed-raced person when my junior high guidance counselor insisted that I mark just one box on the race and ethnicity portion of a state-issued exam (on which there was no “Other” box option):  “It’s not that hard, just pick one,” she shrugged.  To me, however, being forced to acknowledge only one half of my heritage clearly meant denying the other half.  This distressing experience created in me a strong passion for helping others understand and relate to what it means to be of mixed heritage. 

Through my interactions with other people of mixed race, I discovered that having to pick “sides” was a common issue of frustration.  Some people felt, as I did, that the form’s limited options were inadequate.  Other people wondered how to answer this seemingly simple question when their personal choice of racial identity did not match the way in which they were viewed by society.  This collective experience of dissatisfaction with a deceivingly simple check box inspired my series, Please Mark Only One.  In these photographs, I used subtle color and other visual cues to encourage viewers to examine the relationship between the flat black and white paper form and the unique physical traits of the person partially obscured by that form.