Inspirado en una imagen de principios del siglo XX de un artista de vodevil pintado mitad blanco y mitad negro, Hank Willis Thomas colaboró con su colega Sanford Biggers para crear La hora cero. Thomas afirma: “Todos somos híbridos culturales. ¿Puedo ser visto como un híbrido, no solo entre blanco y negro, sino también entre hombre y mujer, estadounidense y africano, o puedo ser visto como alguien que existe en múltiples lugares de múltiples maneras al mismo tiempo?”

Zero Hour by artist Hank Willis Thomas includes six framed photographs of artist Sanford Biggers that takes viewers on a journey of vision and struggle to find contentment with conflict. Biggers’s posture shifts from looking directly in front of him (faced to the side of the viewer) and then slowly turning his gaze inward at his viewer. At a distance from the work the image appears unified, but upon closer observation the physical posture of the sitter reflects a deeper conflict.

Thomas’s strategic use of materials and history creates a binary effect. Half of Biggers’s face and clothing are painted black, and half is painted white Through the use of Lumisty—a film that scatters light—Thomas obfuscates the viewers’ ability to stand in one physical space and clearly see the figure. As your body moves across the work, a holographic image appears, which is further impacted by the shift of Biggers’s posture.

This binary effect calls to mind Double Consciousness, a term coined by Dr. W.E.B. Dubois at the turn of the twentieth century that was used to explain an internal conflict that many Black Americans experience with regard to constantly shifting external definitions of what it means to be Black. A great example is minstrelsy, an American form of entertainment during Dubois’s time that began in the mid-nineteenth century, where White performers would put shoe polish on their faces and act out scenes of Black life filled with stereotypes. At the same time that performers are creating negative stereotypes of Black Americans, there was still a contrasting effort for Black Americans to be seen as human beings and citizens. Thomas’s figure is dressed in a top hat and coattails, which is a similar style of dress as minstrel performers. Biggers’s shifting posture can be read as a commentary on these two conflicting positions of representation.