This Major Survey Exhibition Features More Than 100 Photographs, Including New Work By The Renowned Southern Artist

For more than 40 years, Sally Mann (American, b. 1951) has made experimental, elegiac and hauntingly beautiful photographs that explore the overarching themes of existence: memory, desire, death, the bonds of family and nature’s indifference to human endeavor. This fall, the High Museum of Art will present the first major survey of her work to travel internationally, “Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings” (Oct. 19, 2019–Feb. 2, 2020). “Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings” will be presented in the High’s Anne Cox Chambers Wing.

Organized by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts, the exhibition presents figure studies, landscapes and architectural views that are united by their common origin and inspiration in the American South. Using her deep love of her homeland and her knowledge of its historically fraught heritage, Mann asks powerful, provocative questions—about history, identity, race and religion—that reverberate across geographic and national boundaries.

The exhibition is co-curated by the High’s recently appointed Donald and Marilyn Keough Family Curator of Photography Sarah Kennel (previously with the Peabody Essex Museum), who developed the project with Sarah Greenough, senior curator of photographs at the National Gallery.

“I’m thrilled to launch my tenure at the High with ‘A Thousand Crossings,’ an exhibition that is not only dear to my heart, but also makes perfect sense for the museum, which awarded Sally Mann the first ‘Picturing the South’ commission in 1996. Mann’s drive to ask the big questions—about love, death, war, race and the fraught process of growing up—coupled with her ability to coax powerful emotional resonances from the materials of her art make her one of today’s most compelling artists.”

“With this exhibition we continue to recognize of the importance of Mann’s work, which explores themes that will strongly resonate with our regional audience but that also addresses universal human concerns,” said Rand Suffolk, the High’s Nancy and Holcombe T. Greene, Jr., director. “We are delighted to have Sarah on board to lead the project, and we look forward to bringing these powerful photographs to Atlanta.”

“Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings” investigates how Mann’s relationship with the South—a place rich in literary and artistic traditions but troubled by history—has shaped her work. The exhibition brings together 109 photographs, including new and previously unpublished work, and is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalog that offers an in-depth exploration of the evolution of Mann’s art.

Organized into five sections—Family, The Land, Last Measure, Abide with Me and What Remains, the exhibition opens with works from the 1980s, when Mann began to photograph her three children at the family’s remote summer cabin on the Maury River near Lexington, Virginia. Made with an 8–x–10-inch view camera, the family pictures refute the stereotypes of childhood, offering instead unsettling visions of its complexity. Rooted in the experience of the natural environment surrounding the cabin—the Arcadian woodlands, rocky cliffs and languid rivers—these works convey the inextricable link between the family and their land and the sanctuary and freedom that it provided them.

The exhibition continues in The Land with photographs of the swamplands, fields and ruined estates Mann encountered as she traveled across Virginia, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi in the 1990s. Hoping to capture what she called the “radical light of the American South,” Mann made pictures in Virginia that glow with a tremulous light, while those made in Louisiana and Mississippi are more blasted and bleak. In these photographs, Mann also began to experiment with her process, employing antique lenses, high-contrast Ortho film and the 19th-century wet plate collodion process. The resulting photographic effects, including light flares, vignetting, blurs, streaks and scratches, serve as metaphors for the South as a site of memory, violence, ruin and rebirth.

Mann used these same techniques for her photographs of Civil War battlefields in the exhibition’s third section, Last Measure. These brooding and elusive pictures evoke the land as history’s graveyard, silently absorbing the blood and bones of the many thousands who perished in battles such as Antietam, Appomattox, Chancellorsville, Cold Harbor, Fredericksburg, Manassas, Spotsylvania and the Wilderness. 

In the early 2000s, Mann continued to reflect on how slavery and segregation had left their mark on the landscape of Virginia and, in turn, shaped her own childhood. The fourth section, Abide with Me, explores these entwined histories. Two groups of photographs imagine the physical and spiritual pathways for African Americans in antebellum and post–Civil War Virginia: the rivers and swamps that were potential escape routes for enslaved people and the churches that promised safe harbor, communion and spiritual deliverance. This section also includes photographs of Virginia Carter, the African American woman who served as Mann’s primary caregiver. A defining and beloved presence in Mann’s life, Carter taught Mann about the profoundly complicated and charged nature of race relations in the South. The last component of this section is a group of pictures of African American men rendered in large prints (50 x 40 inches) made from collodion negatives. Representing the artist’s desire to reach across what she described as “the seemingly untraversable chasm of race in the American South,” these powerful photographs explore Mann’s own position in relation to the region’s fraught racial history.

The final section of the exhibition, What Remains, explores themes of time, transformation and death through photographs of Mann and her family. Her enduring fascination with decay and the body’s vulnerability to the ravages of time is evident in a series of spectral portraits of her children’s faces and intimate photographs detailing the changing body of her husband, Larry, who suffers from muscular dystrophy. The exhibition closes with several riveting self-portraits Mann made in the wake of an accident. Here, her links to Southern literature and her preoccupation with decay are in full evidence: the pitted, scratched, ravaged and cloudy surfaces of the prints function as analogues for the body’s corrosion and death. The impression of the series as a whole is of an artist confronting her own mortality with composure and conviction.

Born in 1951 in Lexington, Virginia, Mann continues to live and work in Rockbridge County. She developed her first roll of film in 1969 and began to work as a professional photographer in 1972. She attended Bennington College, Vermont, and graduated in 1974 with a Bachelor of Arts in literature from Hollins College, Roanoke, Virginia, where she earned a Master of Arts in creative writing the following year. She has exhibited widely and published her photographs in the books “Second Sight: The Photographs of Sally Mann” (1983), “Sweet Silent Thought: Platinum Prints by Sally Mann” (1987), “At Twelve: Portraits of Young Women” (1988), “Immediate Family” (1992), “Still Time” (1994), “Mother Land: Recent Landscapes of Georgia and Virginia” (1997), “What Remains” (2003), “Deep South” (2005), “Sally Mann: Photographs and Poetry” (2005), “Proud Flesh” (2009), “Sally Mann: The Flesh and the Spirit” (2010) and “Remembered Light: Cy Twombly in Lexington” (2016).

Mann’s bestselling memoir, “Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs” (2015), was a finalist for the National Book Award. In 1996, Mann was selected to inaugurate the High’s “Picturing the South” photography series, a distinctive initiative that creates new bodies of work inspired by the American South for the Museum’s collection. She has received numerous other honors as well as grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Guggenheim Foundation. In 2011 Mann delivered the prestigious William E. Massey Sr. Lectures in the History of American Civilization at Harvard University.

Published by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts, in association with Abrams, this richly illustrated monograph constitutes an in-depth exploration of the evolution of Mann’s art through its five sections: Family, The Land, Last Measure, Abide with Me and What Remains. Plate sections are enriched by the inclusion of quotations from Mann herself and from her most beloved authors. Essays by curators Sarah Greenough and Sarah Kennel analyze Mann’s photographic development in concert with her literary interests and Mann’s family photographs, respectively. In their valuable contributions, Hilton Als, New Yorker staff writer and recipient of the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Criticism; Malcolm Daniel, Gus and Lyndall Wortham Curator of Photography, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and Drew Gilpin Faust, former president and Lincoln Professor of History, Harvard University, explore literary and photographic responses to racism in the South, Mann’s debt to 19th-century photographers and techniques, and the landscape as repository of cultural and personal memory. Featuring 230 color illustrations, the 332-page catalog will be available at the High Museum Shop.

Exhibition Organization and Support
“Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings” is organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts. This exhibition is made possible by Premier Exhibition Series Sponsor Delta Air Lines, Inc.; Exhibition Series Sponsors Georgia Natural Gas, Northside Hospital and WarnerMedia; Premier Exhibition Series Supporters the Antinori Foundation, Sarah and Jim Kennedy, Louise Sams and Jerome Grilhot, and wish foundation; Benefactor Exhibition Series Supporter Anne Cox Chambers Foundation; Ambassador Exhibition Series Supporters Tom and Susan Wardell and Rod Westmoreland; and Contributing Exhibition Series Supporters Lucinda W. Bunnen, Marcia and John Donnell, W. Daniel Ebersole and Sarah Eby-Ebersole, Peggy Foreman, Robin and Hilton Howell, Mr. and Mrs. Baxter Jones, Margot and Danny McCaul, Joel Knox and Joan Marmo, and The Ron and Lisa Brill Family Charitable Trust. Generous support is also provided by the Alfred and Adele Davis Exhibition Endowment Fund, Anne Cox Chambers Exhibition Fund, Barbara Stewart Exhibition Fund, Dorothy Smith Hopkins Exhibition Endowment Fund, Eleanor McDonald Storza Exhibition Endowment Fund, The Fay and Barrett Howell Exhibition Fund, Forward Arts Foundation Exhibition Endowment Fund, Helen S. Lanier Endowment Fund, Isobel Anne Fraser–Nancy Fraser Parker Exhibition Endowment Fund, John H. and Wilhelmina D. Harland Exhibition Endowment Fund, Katherine Murphy Riley Special Exhibition Endowment Fund, Margaretta Taylor Exhibition Fund, and the RJR Nabisco Exhibition Endowment Fund.

About the High Museum of Art
Located in the heart of Atlanta, Georgia, the High Museum of Art connects with audiences from across the Southeast and around the world through its distinguished collection, dynamic schedule of special exhibitions and engaging community-focused programs. Housed within facilities designed by Pritzker Prize–winning architects Richard Meier and Renzo Piano, the High features a collection of more than 17,000 works of art, including an extensive anthology of 19th- and 20th-century American fine and decorative arts; major holdings of photography and folk and self-taught work, especially that of artists from the American South; burgeoning collections of modern and contemporary art, including paintings, sculpture, new media and design; a growing collection of African art, with work dating from pre-history through the present; and significant holdings of European paintings and works on paper. The High is dedicated to reflecting the diversity of its communities and offering a variety of exhibitions and educational programs that engage visitors with the world of art, the lives of artists and the creative process. For more information about the High, visit www.high.org.

Drawing, the most intimate and immediate form of artistic creation, reached one of its pinnacles in the Netherlands during the 17th century—a period commonly known as the Golden Age. Produced in a broad range of media, including chalk, ink, and watercolor, the drawings in Rubens, Rembrandt, and Drawing in the Golden Age (September 28, 2019-January 5, 2020) at the Art Institute of Chicago are captivating examples of artistic skill and imagination. Together they provide a new view of the creativity and working process of Netherlandish artists in the 17th century and reveal how drawings came to be the celebrated works of art we know them to be today.

While the story of early modern Dutch and Flemish art typically focuses on the paintings created during the time, this exhibition constructs an alternative narrative, casting drawings not in supporting roles but as the main characters. Featuring works by Rembrandt van Rijn, Peter Paul Rubens, Hendrick Goltzius, Gerrit von Honthorst, Jacques de Gheyn II, and many others, the show traces the development of drawing in this period, exploring its many roles in artistic training, its preparatory function for works in other media, and its eventual emergence as a medium in its own right.

The 17th century brought remarkable change in to the northern and southern Netherlands, including political upheaval, religious schism, and scientific innovation. The reverberating effects of these events had a great impact on art—what kind of art was in demand, who could and did produce art, and where and how art was made. Most artists in 17th-century Netherlands chose their career through family connections, training with a relative who worked in an artistic trade, although there are significant exceptions to this trajectory—Rubens was the son of a lawyer and Rembrandt the son of a miller.

To become a respected artist, one needed to study under a successful and skilled master in a workshop or art academy. Abraham Bloemaert, Rubens, and Rembrandt supervised the three most important workshops of the period, overseeing the development of dozens, if not hundreds, of students. In these workshops, learning to draw was essential. Once an apprentice had mastered basic drawing skills by copying other works and drawing plaster casts or monuments, often traveling to Italy to do so, he progressed to creating drawings “from life.” The ability to accurately depict the human face and body was critical to an artist’s success and was especially important for those who aspired to create history paintings—the genre considered most prestigious because it relied on literary sources and often required portraying multiple figures in complex and dramatic scenes.

Rembrandt, more than other artists of this period, embraced life drawing. Most notably, he pioneered the collective study of the female nude—a commonplace practice today, but one that challenged the bounds of decency in the 17th century. Studying the live figure increasingly became standard practice in the Netherlands during this period, but it was generally restricted to drawing male models, since prevailing cultural norms made it difficult for artists to find women to pose for them, especially in the nude. Among the most celebrated of all Rembrandt’s drawings is a rare study of a female nude, which is featured in this exhibition. An emotive and striking work, it highlights the importance for artists of the period to learn to draw the female figure. This skill, despite its inherent challenges, was necessary to receive critical acclaim.

Although drawings in the 17th century served many purposes— as reference materials, studies for future paintings, preparatory designs for prints—they also emerged as independent works of art, bought, commissioned, and collected by wealthy merchants. This was due in part to the rise of a new genre of drawing: the landscape. Works depicting the natural world and countryside appealed to an increasingly affluent merchant class that lived in a dense urban environment. These city dwellers enthusiastically received highly finished landscape drawings and deemed them objects worthy of preservation and display.

Major support for Rubens, Rembrandt, and Drawing in the Golden Age is provided by the Wolfgang Ratjen Foundation, Liechtenstein.

Mark Twain and the Holy Land On View October 25, 2019 – February 2, 2020

New-York Historical Society celebrates the 150th anniversary of one of the best-selling travelogues of all time with Mark Twain and the Holy Land, on view October 25, 2019 – February 2, 2020. This new exhibition traces the legendary American humorist’s 1867 voyage to the Mediterranean and his subsequent 1869 book—The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims’ Progress—through original documents, photographs, artwork, and costumes, as well as an interactive media experience. Organized by New-York Historical in partnership with the Shapell Manuscript Foundation, it is curated by Michael Ryan, vice president and director of the Patricia D. Klingenstein Library, and Cristian Petru Panaite, associate curator of exhibitions.

“Setting sail from New York for a great adventure abroad, Mark Twain captured the feelings and reactions of many Americans exploring beyond their borders, inspiring generations of travelers to document their voyages,” said Dr. Louise Mirrer, president and CEO of the New-York Historical Society. “We are pleased to partner with the Shapell Manuscript Foundation to present the history behind this influential book by Twain, a uniquely American writer whose work helped to define American culture in the postbellum era.”

In 1867, Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835-1910)—known professionally as Mark Twain—departed New York harbor on the steamship Quaker City for a five-and-a-half-month excursion, with stops in Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Holy Land. Known at that point for his biting satire and humorous short pieces on California and the West, Clemens had serendipitously discovered a “pleasure cruise” to Europe and the Near East, and successfully inveigled his way onto the journey with an assignment from the San Francisco newspaper Alta California. Twain was to supply the paper with weekly columns about the trip and his fellow passengers. When he returned to New York and then to Washington, D.C., he began reshaping those columns and other notes made during the trip into a book, The Innocents Abroad (1869). It was this work that catapulted Twain to national fame, selling more copies during his lifetime than any other book he ever wrote.

“Musing about the voyage in a passage later published in Innocents Abroad, Twain so aptly noted: ‘Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness,’” said Benjamin Shapell, President of the Shapell Manuscript Foundation. “That his travelogue espoused such a liberal sentiment while at the very same time also exposing the deep closed-mindedness of his fellow shipmates is the very reason why Twain’s biting perspective comes across as so fresh to us even today. We are pleased that the New-York Historical Society has brought together these rare manuscripts and artifacts, bringing Twain’s lively, influential, and singular experience to life.”

American Protestants approached the Holy Land in awe and reverence, their visions of it having been shaped by romantic travel literature that described Palestine as majestic and grand. Examples of this literature are on display along with contemporary illustrations of the Holy Land, such as Hubert Sattler’s View of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives (1847), on loan from the Dahesh Museum of Art. In reality, the Holy Land in the 19th century was a remote and neglected outpost of the Ottoman Empire.

The Quaker City cruise was the first organized tourism trip in American history; the steamship was opulently outfitted with a library, printing press, piano, and pipe organ. A Quaker City passenger list, receipt for voyage, and an oil painting of the steamship are on display, as well as a journal entry from April 1867, in which Twain announces his plan to embark on the voyage. Photographer William E. James was also on board and documented many of the sights in stereoscopic images; James’ camera and a selection of seemingly three-dimensional stereoscopic images are on view on an interactive touch screen.

After stops in Europe, the travelers were greeted in Beirut by a grand caravan of horses and mules for a journey of 155 miles to “Baalbec, Damascus, the Sea of Tiberias, and thence southward by the way of the scene of Jacob’s Dream and other notable Bible localities to Jerusalem.” But the pomp was in glaring contrast to the reality of a small, barren land, which was not the vast and monumental landscape suggested by the Bible. Twain was disappointed that “a fast walker could go outside the walls of Jerusalem and walk entirely around the city in an hour,” and a manuscript leaf on view features Twain’s withering satirical soliloquy about the Tomb of Adam at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre: “The tomb of Adam! How touching it was here in a land of strangers, far away from home, and friends, and all who cared for me, thus to discover the grave of a blood relation.”

Twain’s caustic view of the Holy Land, with its nomads, beggars, and ruins was the author’s way of proclaiming the arrival of the new American traveler, someone who saw the world for what it was, without the distorting lenses of tradition and received authority. Twain had sampled the guides and travel volumes and found them all without foundation.

The voyage of the Quaker City was well documented, and the exhibit presents not only the photographs by James, but manuscripts and letters by Twain, a Dragoman costume, and Turkish slippers worn by Twain’s future bride, Olivia Langdon.

It took Twain and his publisher a good two years to bring Innocents to fruition in 1869, but once in print, its success was immediate. Twain’s scabrous humor found an eager and receptive audience, well documented in contemporary reviews on display in the show. Innocents undoubtedly contributed to the vogue for traveling to the Holy Land, and the exhibit features letters by such notables as President Ulysses Grant, Gen. William T. Sherman, and Theodore Roosevelt, each of whom journeyed to Palestine.

Mark Twain and the Holy Land introduces visitors both to a young Mark Twain on the eve of celebrity and to Palestine in the 19th century, captured by artists, writers, and photographers.

On October 24, Jonathan D. Sarna, University Professor and the Joseph H. & Belle R. Braun Professor of American Jewish History at Brandeis University, and Gil Troy, Professor of History at McGill University, will discuss Mark Twain and the Holy Land: A New Look.

Exhibitions at New-York Historical are made possible by Dr. Agnes Hsu-Tang and Oscar Tang, the Saunders Trust for American History, the Seymour Neuman Endowed Fund, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. WNET is the media sponsor.

Career-Spanning Exhibition Will Feature more than 80 prints from the Museum’s unparalleled collection of Laughlin’s photographs

Dubbed the “Father of American Surrealism,” Clarence John Laughlin (1905–1985) was the most important Southern photographer of his time and a singular figure in the development of the American school of photography. This upcoming spring, the High Museum of Art (1280 Peachtree St NE, Atlanta, GA, 30309, 404-733-4400) will celebrate his legacy with the comprehensive exhibition “Strange Light: The Photography of Clarence John Laughlin” (May 11, 2020 through Nov. 10, 2019).

The High Museum of Art began collecting photographs in the early 1970s, making it among the earliest museums to commit to the medium. Today, the High’s photography department is one of the nation’s leading programs with more than 7,000 prints in its collection. These holdings encompass work from around the world made by diverse practitioners, from artists to entrepreneurs, journalists and scientists. Spanning the very beginnings of the medium in the 1840s to the present, the High’s collection has particular strengths in American modernist and documentary traditions from the mid-20th century as well as current contemporary trends. The photography collection maintains a strong base of pictures related to the American South and situates this work within a global context that is both regionally relevant and internationally significant.

The High owns one of the largest collections of photographs of the civil rights movement and some of the country’s strongest monographic collections of photographs by Eugene Atget, Wynn Bullock, Harry Callahan, William Christenberry, Walker Evans, Leonard Freed, Evelyn Hofer, Clarence John Laughlin, Abelardo Morell and Peter Sekaer.

The High boasts one of the largest and most important monographic holdings of Laughlin’s works and “Strange Light” surveys Laughlin’s signature photographs between 1935 and 1965 from more than 80 prints in the Museum’s collection, including many from a landmark 2015 acquisition that will be on view at the High for the first time.

“The High has a longstanding commitment to supporting Southern artists, and we were one of the first museums to develop deep holdings of Laughlin’s work, which we began collecting in the 1970s,” said Rand Suffolk, Nancy and Holcombe T. Green, Jr., director of the High. “This exhibition will mark our largest presentation of his work and reveal the genius of one of the region’s most pioneering 20th-century artists.”

Laughlin considered himself a writer first and a photographer second, and he saw image making as a form of visual poetry. Known primarily for his atmospheric depictions of the decaying antebellum architecture that proliferated in his hometown of New Orleans, Laughlin approached photography with a romantic, experimental eye that diverged strongly from the style of his peers, who championed realism and social documentary.

The exhibition explores Laughlin’s literary leanings in great depth by placing his photographs in relationship to Southern Gothic literature and other regional literary genres, which were widely popular in the 1940s.  “Strange Light” also attests to Laughlin’s innovative approach and insight into photography’s development.

“From allegorical social commentary, to expertly constructed narratives, to bizarre material experimentation, Laughlin’s effort to access a higher artistic potential for photography is evident throughout his career,” said the High’s Associate Curator of Photography, Gregory Harris. “His desire to push the limits of photographic possibility paved the way for generations of artists and the growth of the medium into a tool of magical potential.”

The exhibition emphasizes Laughlin’s inventiveness, artistic influences, and deep connection to the written word, with sections focused on his inspirations and major bodies of work:

• Friends and Influences – Laughlin’s artistic education was self-directed and included extensive correspondences with fellow photographers (including Alfred Stieglitz, Man Ray, Edward Weston and Wynn Bullock) and a legendary collection of books. This gallery will feature works by several of the key artists who influenced Laughlin’s development and will display some of the catalogues he worked on obsessively during his lifetime.
• Antebellum Architecture – Hired by the Army Corp of Engineers to document the building of New Orleans’ levees in the 1940s, Laughlin used his spare time along the Mississippi River to document the abandoned plantation homes of the Old South. These eerie architectural images revealed crumbling ghosts of the antebellum past and were Laughlin’s first works to receive attention from galleries and publishers.
• Natural Forms – Among Laughlin’s thematic groupings, he dedicated several to ubiquitous physical forms, such as rocks and trees. His depictions of the natural world, however, were not meant to be meditations on the beauty of nature but rather to demonstrate the transformative potential of looking at the subject with an imaginative eye. Through darkroom techniques, framing and high contrast, Laughlin animated these forms with emotional, spiritual resonance.
• Architecture and Haunted Spaces – Architecture was what first inspired Laughlin to make photographs. In the 1940s and ’50s, as the post-war industrial boom was leading to the destruction of older buildings to make way for modern structures, Laughlin exhibited his love of the old by preserving New Orleans’ historic buildings through photographs. He was especially attracted to vaulted ceilings, staircases and molding details, which he photographed in ways that imbued them with haunted energy.
• Visual Poems – Throughout his career, Laughlin sought to expand the metaphoric possibilities of photography, firmly believing that a picture was never merely about the thing it depicted. These “visual poems,” as he called them, embodied his lofty literary aspirations. In elaborately staged scenes often augmented by experimental printing techniques, Laughlin created countless narrative or poetic vignettes that offered an allegorical commentary on culture and politics while trying to express a deeper spiritual state of being.
• Process and Experimentation – From double exposures, to collage, to camera-less photographs, Laughlin pushed the possibilities of photography to its physical limits. This type of surreal experimentation was popular in Europe in the early to mid-20th century, while the American school of photography was primarily concerned with documenting reality. As a result, it wasn’t until artists and photographers began to embrace experimentation in the 1970s and ’80s that Laughlin’s work received its overdue recognition and cemented his place in the canon as the “Father of American Surrealism.” This gallery demonstrates Laughlin’s varied disruptions to typical photographic processes and underscores his forward-thinking approach to image making.

“Strange Light: The Photography of Clarence John Laughlin” will be presented in the Lucinda Weil Bunnen Gallery for Photography, located on the lower level of the High’s Wieland Pavilion.

“Strange Light: The Photography of Clarence John Laughlin” is organized by the High Museum of Art, Atlanta. This exhibition is made possible by Exhibition Series Sponsors Delta Air Lines, Inc., and Turner; Premier Exhibition Series Supporters the Antinori Foundation, Sarah and Jim Kennedy, and Louise Sams and Jerome Grilhot; Benefactor Exhibition Series Supporter Anne Cox Chambers Foundation; Ambassador Exhibition Series Supporters Tom and Susan Wardell and Rod Westmoreland; and Contributing Exhibition Series Supporters the Ron and Lisa Brill Family Charitable Trust, Lucinda W. Bunnen, Corporate Environments, Marcia and John Donnell, W. Daniel Ebersole and Sarah Eby-Ebersole, Peggy Foreman, Robin and Hilton Howell, Mr. and Mrs. Baxter Jones, and Margot and Danny McCaul.

Generous support is also provided by the Alfred and Adele Davis Exhibition Endowment Fund, Anne Cox Chambers Exhibition Fund, Barbara Stewart Exhibition Fund, Marjorie and Carter Crittenden, Dorothy Smith Hopkins Exhibition Endowment Fund, Eleanor McDonald Storza Exhibition Endowment Fund, The Fay and Barrett Howell Exhibition Fund, Forward Arts Foundation Exhibition Endowment Fund, Helen S. Lanier Endowment Fund, Isobel Anne Fraser–Nancy Fraser Parker Exhibition Endowment Fund, John H. and Wilhelmina D. Harland Exhibition Endowment Fund, Katherine Murphy Riley Special Exhibition Endowment Fund, Margaretta Taylor Exhibition Fund, RJR Nabisco Exhibition Endowment Fund, and Dr. Diane L. Wisebram.

Holiday Express: All Aboard to Richard Scarry’s Busytown On View November 1, 2019 – February 23, 2020

Celebrating Richard Scarry and Busytown with Special Guest, Huck Scarry, Saturday, December 14 and Sunday, December 15

A holiday favorite returns to the New-York Historical Society 170 Central Park West at Richard Gilder Way (77th Street), New York, NY 10024, Phone (212) 873-3400) this season—reimagined to celebrate the 100th birthday of Busytown series author and illustrator Richard Scarry. Holiday Express: All Aboard to Richard Scarry’s Busytown (November 1, 2019 – February 23, 2020) showcases artwork and graphics of Scarry’s characters like Huckle Cat and Lowly Worm from publisher Random House Children’s Books alongside more than 300 objects from the Jerni Collection’s antique toy trains, stations, and accessories. Using Busytown stories and characters, dynamic displays explore the workings of the railroad, the services it provides, and the jobs required to keep people and goods moving. An assortment of kid-friendly activities, story times, and crafts accompany the exhibition throughout its run, welcoming families into the world of classic toys and trains.

Richard “Huck” Scarry Jr., the son of Richard Scarry, will make a special appearance on December 14 and 15. Holiday Express: All Aboard to Richard Scarry’s Busytown is supported by Bloomberg Philanthropies*. Additional support provided by Random House Children’s Books.

Since its acquisition by the New-York Historical Society in 2014, the Jerni Collection has become a highlight of the Museum’s holdings. Assembled over the course of five decades by U.S. collectors Jerry and Nina Greene, the Jerni Collection is considered one of the world’s leading collections of antique model trains and toys and includes unique, handcrafted, and hand-painted pieces dating from approximately 1850 to 1940, and features prime examples by the leading manufacturers that set the standard for the Golden Age of Toy Trains, including the German firms of Märklin and Bing, as well as the American firms Lionel and Ives. (* Bloomberg Philanthropies has sponsored the annual Holiday Express exhibition at the New-York Historical Society since 2014.)

Richard Scarry is one of the world’s most beloved children’s authors. In his extraordinary career, Scarry illustrated over 150 books, many of which have never been out of print. His books have sold over 100 million copies around the world and are currently published in over 20 languages.

Just like his father, Huck Scarry was always drawing and would often assist his dad in coloring his drawings. After his father’s passing in 1994, Huck took up the mantle of creating new books about Richard Scarry’s charming and funny characters. “My father would be so thrilled with the Holiday Express exhibition at the New-York Historical Society,” said Huck Scarry. “We would often visit New York City, and when we did, we always took the train. So much to see and do! Like our many Busytown friends, we enjoyed our trip because a train ride is always a bit of an adventure!”

“We’re delighted to celebrate Richard Scarry’s centennial by bringing Busytown to life at the New-York Historical Society this holiday season,” said Dr. Louise Mirrer, president and CEO of New-York Historical. “Pairing iconic characters like Huckle Cat with historic toys and trains from our incomparable Jerni Collection is the perfect way for visitors of all ages to explore the history of transportation in a whimsical way.”

Busytown is the inspiration for a special installation that uses three Scarry stories and objects from the Jerni Collection to illustrate rail travel in 1919, the year of Scarry’s birth. In Waiting at the Station, characters Huckle Cat and Sally Cat eagerly await the arrival of a train, as miniature figures of porters and other workers bustle around the station. In Betsy Bear’s Letter to Grandma, toy trains demonstrate how post offices and railroads worked together to keep people in touch. And in Coal Makes Electricity Work for Us, a miniature underground mine, elevators, and hoppers show how coal was turned into power.

More than two dozen never-before-displayed objects from the Jerni Collection are on view for the first time this year, including Märklin’s rare “Garden Station,” manufactured in 1900. Other highlights include a toy textile factory from 1910 by Ernst Planck and Gebrüder Bing’s English market “Charles Dickens” locomotive with tender and coaches, produced in 1905. Also on view: a Bing Steam Toy Train from 1912, which was once powered by a real, working steam engine, making it an exceedingly risky plaything in its day. To top it all off, eight sets of running trains encircle the displays overhead and are sure to delight children (and adults!) of all ages.

Large-scale cutouts of Scarry’s iconic characters are displayed throughout the museum, and interactive elements, including a crawl-through space leading to a pop-up observation bubble, allow children to get an up-close view of the displays, harking back to the feel of early 20th century toy departments.

Holiday Express: All Aboard to Richard Scarry’s Busytown Family Programs
Fun, train-related activities for kids of all ages take place through the exhibition’s run―all free with Museum Admission.

Celebrating Richard Scarry and Busytown!
Saturday, December 14 and Sunday, December 15; 1–3 pm
All aboard! Holiday Express returns this year with a special new addition—scenes from Richard Scarry’s Busytown! On this weekend, families will join Huck Scarry in a draw-along of beloved Busytown characters and chat about his father. Children will decorate their own Busytown vehicles, create finger puppets, listen to Busytown tales, and go on a pretend train journey with our favorite Conductor Abe!

December School Vacation Week, Thursday, December 26 – Wednesday, January 1
Stop by New-York Historical during our annual, train-filled Vacation Week. Take part in an “I Spy” scavenger hunt, play at our train table, listen to a classic train story, and make a rail-themed craft to take home!

Holiday Express “I Spy” Scavenger Hunt, All day (Recommended for ages 4 and up)
I SPY, WITH MY LITTLE EYE, A DOG, A SHIP, AND EVEN A FLYING MACHINE! Pick up an “I Spy” scavenger hunt and get the whole family involved on an adventure through Holiday Express. Kids and adults alike will delight in discovering surprises among all the toys and trains.

Train Tales and Crafts, Daily, 2 pm, All Ages
COME FOR THE CLASSIC TRAIN STORY AND STAY FOR THE CRAFTS! Rail-themed books for December School Vacation Week include The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper; Steam Train, Dream Train written by Sherri Duskey Rinker and illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld; Shark vs. Train written by Chris Barton and illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld; and more.

Holiday Express: All Aboard to Richard Scarry’s Busytown is curated by Mike Thornton, associate curator of material culture at the New-York Historical Society. The original Holiday Express display was designed by Lee H. Skolnick Architecture + Design Partnership (LHSA+DP), an integrated architecture and exhibit design firm that also designed New-York Historical’s DiMenna Children’s History Museum. Other consultants for Holiday Express include T W TrainWorx, a nationally recognized model train specialist and designer of custom toy train layouts; and exhibition media producers Batwin + Robin, renowned “media storytellers” with more than 20 years of experience in the theater, museums, and other venues.

Exhibitions at New-York Historical are made possible by Dr. Agnes Hsu-Tang and Oscar Tang, the Saunders Trust for American History, the Seymour Neuman Endowed Fund, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. WNET is the media sponsor.

Beyond Midnight: Paul Revere On View Through January 12, 2020

This fall, the New-York Historical Society explores the life and accomplishments of Paul Revere (1735–1818), the Revolutionary War patriot immortalized in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s 1861 poem, “Paul Revere’s Ride.” On view now through January 12, 2020, Beyond Midnight: Paul Revere separates fact from fiction, revealing Revere as a complex, multifaceted figure at the intersection of America’s social, economic, artistic, and political life in Revolutionary War-era Boston as it re-examines his life as an artisan, activist, and entrepreneur. The exhibition, featuring more than 140 objects, highlights aspects of Revere’s versatile career as an artisan, including engravings, such as his well-known depiction of the Boston Massacre; glimmering silver tea services made for prominent clients; everyday objects such as thimbles, tankards, and teapots; and important public commissions, such as a bronze courthouse bell.

Organized by the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Massachusetts, and curated by Nan Wolverton and Lauren Hewes, Beyond Midnight debuts at New-York Historical before traveling to the Worcester Art Museum and the Concord Museum in Massachusetts for a two-venue display (February 13 – June 7, 2020) and to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas (July 4 – October 11, 2020). At New-York Historical, Beyond Midnight is coordinated by Debra Schmidt Bach, New-York Historical’s curator of decorative arts.

“When many of us think of Paul Revere, we instantly think of Longfellow’s lines ‘One if by land, and two if by sea’, but there is much more to Revere’s story,” said Dr. Louise Mirrer, president and CEO of the New-York Historical Society. “This exhibition looks beyond the myth of Paul Revere to better understand the man as a revolutionary, an artisan, and an entrepreneur, who would go on to become a legend. We are proud to partner with the American Antiquarian Society to debut this exhibition in New York.”

On arrival, visitors are welcomed by a nine-foot-tall re-creation of the grand obelisk made for a 1766 Boston Common celebration of the repeal of the Stamp Act, the first tax levied on the American colonies by England. Originally made of wood and oiled paper, and decorated with painted scenes, portraits, and text praising King George while also mocking British legislators, the obelisk was illuminated from inside and eventually consumed by flames at the Boston event. The only remaining visual evidence is Revere’s 1766 engraving of the design, also on view.

A Revolutionary activist, Paul Revere was a member of the Sons of Liberty, a secret group opposed to British colonial policy including taxation that kept track of British troop movements and war ships in the harbor. The exhibition displays Revere’s 1770 engraving of the landing of British forces at Boston’s Long Wharf. Four versions of Revere’s provocative engraving of the 1770 Boston Massacre are also reunited in the exhibition. The engravings capture the moment when British soldiers fired upon a crowd of unruly colonists in front of the Custom House. The print inflamed anti-British sentiment, and different versions of it were widely disseminated as Patriot propaganda. Revere also helped plan and execute the Boston Tea Party in 1773, hurling tea into Boston Harbor. When war erupted in 1775, he delivered messages from the Continental Army to New York, Philadelphia, and Connecticut.

Paul Revere was a master craftsman specializing in metalwork, including copperplate engravings and fashionable and functional objects made from silver, gold, brass, bronze, and copper. An innovative businessman, Revere expanded his successful silver shop in the years after the war to produce goods that took advantage of new machinery. His fluted oval teapot, made from machine-rolled sheet silver, became an icon of American Federal silver design. Among the silver objects on view are two rare wine goblets possibly used as Kiddush cups made by Revere for Moses Michael Hays—his only known Jewish client—as well as grand tea services, teapots, tankards, teaspoons, and toy whistles created in Revere’s shop. Also featured is a 1796 cast-bronze courthouse bell made for the Norfolk County Courthouse in Dedham, Massachusetts. The exhibition also explores how Revere’s trade networks reached well beyond Boston. He frequently bought and sold raw and finished copper from New Yorker Harmon Hendricks and supplied copper for Robert Fulton’s famous steamship.

The son of a French Huguenot immigrant artisan, Revere belonged to an economic class called “mechanics,” ranked below merchants, lawyers, and clergymen. However, Revere was a savvy networker, and what he lacked in social status, he made up for by cultivating influential connections. Membership in the Sons of Liberty led to commissions from fellow Patriots, but he also welcomed Loyalist clients, setting aside politics for profit. On view are nine elements from a grand, 45-piece beverage service that Revere created in 1773 for prominent Loyalist Dr. William Paine—the largest commission of his career—just two months before the Boston Tea Party.

Paul Revere died in 1818, but his fame endured, initially for his metalwork and then for his patriotism. In the 1830s, Revere’s engravings were rediscovered as Americans explored their Revolutionary past, and his view of the Boston Massacre appeared in children’s history books. In 1860, poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was inspired to write “Paul Revere’s Ride,” romanticizing (and somewhat embellishing) the story of Revere’s journey to Lexington. The poem first appeared in the Atlantic Monthly in January 1861—an original copy of the magazine is on view in the exhibition. Artist Grant Wood’s painting Midnight Ride of Paul Revere (1931), also on display, depicts a dramatic scene of Revere riding past Boston’s Old North Church. This is also an embellishment: In reality, Revere was on foot until he crossed the Charles River to Cambridge and then rode a borrowed horse to Lexington. He was also one of three riders and was stopped briefly by British officers and then released. A map of the actual ride is on display. These works and others enshrined Paul Revere at the heart of the nation’s founding story. By the turn of the 20th century, the tale of Paul Revere and his midnight ride was firmly established in the nation’s psyche as truth, not fiction, and Revere’s contributions as a metalsmith and artisan were overshadowed.

Publication and Programming

Drawing on the American Antiquarian Society’s unparalleled collection of prints and books, a catalogue accompanies the exhibition, Beyond Midnight: Paul Revere, transforming readers’ understanding of the iconic colonial patriot. Essays examine Revere as a patriot, a manufacturer, a precious metalsmith, a printer, and an engraver. His legacy as a polymath is documented in the book’s complete illustrated checklist of the exhibition’s artifacts. The book is available exclusively from the NYHistory Store.

A robust line-up of engaging programs and family activities take place throughout the exhibition’s run that delve into Revere and his contemporaries. On October 17, historians Annette Gordon-Reed and Philip Bobbitt discuss Thomas Jefferson. On November 13, Nina Zannieri, Robert Shimp, and Carol Berkin explore the truth behind Revere’s famous ride. On December 12, George Washington is the topic of conversation between scholars Denver Brunsman and Carol Berkin. Also in the fall, architectural historian Barry Lewis traces the history of the colonial and federal style on a date to be announced.

On weekends during Beyond Midnight: Paul Revere, Living Historians are stationed at the Museum, bringing Paul Revere’s world to life for young visitors. Kids can interact with skilled tradespeople, like a milliner, apothecary, and bookbinder (October 5-6). Spies from the Continental Army’s intelligence system are on hand to teach their secretive methods (November 2-3) while hands-on explorations into historical tooth extraction, filings, and tooth replacement may give visitors a new appreciation for their dentists (November 23-24). On select Saturdays (October 19, November 16, and December 7), families can discover the history of colonial drinks, the global chocolate trade, and colonial silver-smithing in a multi-sensory program supported by American Heritage Chocolate. On October 20, aspiring young writers ages 12 and up can take part in a narrative poetry workshop with Writopia Lab and develop original narrative poems that reveal inspiring stories of key figures from the recent and distant past.

Major support for Beyond Midnight: Paul Revere was provided by the Richard C. von Hess Foundation and the Henry Luce Foundation. The exhibition at New-York Historical is made possible by the May and Samuel Rudin Family Foundation, Inc. Additional support provided by Richard Brown and Mary Jo Otsea. Exhibitions at New-York Historical are made possible by Dr. Agnes Hsu-Tang and Oscar Tang, the Saunders Trust for American History, the Seymour Neuman Endowed Fund, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. WNET is the media sponsor.

Founded in 1812 by Revolutionary War patriot and printer Isaiah Thomas, the American Antiquarian Society (AAS) is both a national learned society and a major independent research library located in Worcester, Massachusetts. The AAS library today houses the largest and most accessible collection of books, pamphlets, broadsides, newspapers, periodicals, music, and graphic arts material printed through 1876 in what is now the United States, as well as manuscripts and a substantial collection of secondary texts, bibliographies, and digital resources and reference works related to all aspects of American history and culture before the 20th century. The Society sponsors a broad range of programs—visiting research fellowships, workshops, seminars, conferences, publications, lectures and performances—for constituencies ranging from school children and their teachers, through undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral scholars, creative and performing artists and writers and the general public. AAS was presented with the 2013 National Humanities Medal by President Obama in a ceremony at the White House.

The New-York Historical Society, one of America’s preeminent cultural institutions, is dedicated to fostering research and presenting history and art exhibitions and public programs that reveal the dynamism of history and its influence on the world of today. Founded in 1804, New-York Historical has a mission to explore the richly layered history of New York City and State and the country, and to serve as a national forum for the discussion of issues surrounding the making and meaning of history. New-York Historical is also home to the Patricia D. Klingenstein Library, one of the oldest, most distinguished libraries in the nation—and one of only 20 in the United States qualified to be a member of the Independent Research Libraries Association—which contains more than three million books, pamphlets, maps, newspapers, manuscripts, prints, photographs, and architectural drawings.

Artist in Exile: The Visual Diary of Baroness Hyde de Neuville, November 1, 2019 – January 26, 2020

Artist in Exile: The Visual Diary of Baroness Hyde de Neuville sheds light on this fascinating artist, whose life reads like a compelling historical novel.

This fall, the New-York Historical Society introduces visitors to a little-known artist whose work documented the people and scenes of early America. Artist in Exile: The Visual Diary of Baroness Hyde de Neuville, on view November 1, 2019 – January 26, 2020 in the Joyce B. Cowin Women’s History Gallery of the Center for Women’s History, presents 114 watercolors and drawings by Anne Marguérite Joséphine Henriette Rouillé de Marigny, Baroness Hyde de Neuville (1771–1849). Self-taught and ahead of her time, Neuville’s art celebrates the young country’s history, culture, and diverse population, ranging from Indigenous Americans to political leaders. Curated by Dr. Roberta J.M. Olson, curator of drawings at New-York Historical, this exhibition is the first serious exploration of Neuville’s life and art—showcasing many recently discovered works including rare depictions of European scenes and people at work, a lifelong sociological interest—and is accompanied by a scholarly catalogue.

“Baroness Hyde de Neuville’s status as a woman, an outsider, and a refugee shaped her view of America and Americans, making her a particularly keen and sympathetic observer of individuals from a range of socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds,” said Dr. Louise Mirrer, president and CEO of the New-York Historical Society. “Neuville could never have envisioned that her visual diary—created as a personal record of her travels and observations of early America—would become an invaluable historical document of the early republic. Yet her drawings vividly evoke the national optimism and rapid expansion of the young United States and capture the diversity of its inhabitants.”

Born to an aristocratic family in Sancerre, France, Henriette married ardent royalist Jean Guillaume Hyde de Neuville, who became involved during the French Revolution in conspiracies to reinstate the Bourbon monarchy and was accused of participating in a plot to assassinate Napoleon. In an effort to disprove the charges against her husband, the baroness took her cause directly to Napoleon, who was impressed with her courage and allowed the couple to go into exile. They arrived in New York in 1807 and stayed for seven years. During their second American residency (1816–22), when her husband served as French Minister Plenipotentiary in Washington, D.C., Henriette became a celebrated hostess. John Quincy Adams described her in his diary as “a woman of excellent temper, amiable disposition… profuse charity, yet judicious economy and sound discretion.” In 1818, she presciently stated that she had but one wish “and that was to see an American lady elected president.”

Artist in Exile follows Neuville’s life, reconstructing her artistic education and tracing her artistic practice, which included portraiture, landscapes and cityscapes, ethnographic studies, botanical art, and other genres. Highlights of the exhibition include Neuville’s views of the Hudson and Mohawk rivers, street scenes of her neighborhood (now known as Tribeca), a watercolor documenting an “Indian War Dance” performed for President Monroe, and portraits of subjects ranging from Indigenous Americans to immigrant students at a Manhattan school founded by the Neuvilles. The exhibition opens with Neuville’s miniature self-portrait (ca. 1800-1810) that was likely created for her husband to carry on his travels. Pictured wearing a fashionable daytime empire-waist dress over a chemisette, fingerless mitts, and hoop earrings, the baroness looks away, not engaging the viewer as is customary with self-portraits that are drawn using a mirror because she based it on another study.

Upon first reaching the United States, the Neuvilles journeyed up the Hudson River and to Niagara Falls, where Henriette was one of the first to record many early settlements, buildings, and rustic scenes. In the watercolor Distant View of Albany from the Hudson River, New York (1807), she drew the panoramic view from the sloop Diana as it traveled downriver from Albany, chronicling the river long before artist William Guy Wall’s renowned Hudson River Portfolio (1820–25). The atmospheric vista conveys the majestic sweep of the Hudson and the reflections on its surface. In Break’s Bridge, Palatine, New York (1808), Neuville, who was intrigued by engineering and technology, depicts a newly constructed Mohawk River bridge destroyed by rushing waters. The couple in the foreground of the image is the Neuvilles, with their pet spaniel, Volero.

Neuville also captured vivid views of New York City residents and buildings—many of them long since demolished—bringing to life the burgeoning urban center and its ethnically diverse population. Corner of Greenwich Street (1810) represents a scene at the intersection of Greenwich and Dey streets. Near the cellar hatch of the brick house at the center stands an Asian man, who may be the Chinese merchant Punqua Winchong, making this work one of the earliest visual records of a Chinese person in the United States.

The Neuvilles contributed to the cultural life in New York as co-founders of the École Économique (Economical School), incorporated in 1810 as the Society of the Economical School of the City of New York. Its mission was to educate the children of French émigrés and fugitives from the French West Indies and to offer affordable education to impoverished children. Henriette sketched the students at the school, and many works from the “Economical School Series” are on view in the exhibition, including the recently discovered life size portrait, Pélagie Drawing a Portrait (1808), which demonstrates the school’s emphasis on drawing. Her series is the only visual record of the school’s existence.

The couple returned to France in 1814 after the fall of Napoleon and the restoration of King Louis XVIII and the Bourbon monarchy. In 1816, Louis XVIII appointed the baron French Minister Plenipotentiary, and the Neuvilles returned to the U.S., settling in Washington, D.C. They became renowned for their lavish Saturday evening parties and their friendships with President James Monroe and James and Dolley Madison. Among the notable events the Neuvilles attended was an “Indian War Dance,” performed by a delegation of 16 leaders of the Plains Indian tribes in front of President Monroe and 6,000 spectators at the White House on November 29, 1821. Neuville’s watercolor documenting the event includes likenesses of half-chief Shaumonekusse (Prairie Wolf) and one of his five wives, Hayne Hudjihini (Eagle of Delight). Later, the “War Dance” was also performed at the Neuvilles’ house.

Neuville’s portraits of individuals celebrate the ethnic and cultural diversity of the early American republic, and her portrayals are notable for their ethnographic integrity and avoidance of stereotypes. In the portrait of Peter of Buffalo, Tonawanda, New York (1807), the sitter has ear lobes pierced with earrings and bare feet, traditional for Seneca tribesmen. Wearing an undershirt, a fur piece, and leggings with garters, he carries a tomahawk, a knife, a powder horn, and a string of wampum. In the portrait Martha Church, Cook in “Ordinary” Costume (1808–10), Neuville depicts a cook in her everyday attire, as part of the artistic tradition of occupational portraits that originated in Europe and appeared in New York in the early 19th century.

The exhibition features works from New-York Historical’s collection, the most extensive in the world, as well as important loans from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the New York Public Library, the Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs; the Museum of the City of New York, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum, Hagley Museum and Library, and Princeton University, Firestone Library, Rare Books and Special Collections, Graphic Arts Collection.

Publication and Programming
Accompanying the exhibition is the scholarly publication Artist in Exile: The Visual Diary of Baroness Hyde de Neuville, published by GILES, an imprint of D Giles Limited. Written by Dr. Roberta J.M. Olson with assistance by Alexandra Mazzitelli, the publication also features an essay by Dr. Charlene M. Boyer Lewis.

A gallery tour of Artist in Exile, led by curator Roberta J.M. Olson, takes place on January 6. In honor of the baroness’ heritage, several French movies will be shown as part of New-York Historical’s Friday night Justice in Film series: 1938’s The Baker’s Wife on November 8 and 1946’s Beauty and the Beast on December 6. On select weekends throughout the exhibition’s run, young visitors can explore the baroness’ life and the art she created with touch objects and Living Historians.

The Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation provided lead funding for Artist in Exile: The Visual Diary of Baroness Hyde de Neuville, with important support given by the Wyeth Foundation for American Art. Additional support provided by Furthermore, a program of the J.M. Kaplan Fund; the Greater Hudson Heritage Network; Nicole, Nathan, and Brian Wagner; Helen Appel; Pam Schafler; David and Laura Grey; and Myron and Adeline Hofer.

Exhibition Includes Rare Prints by 20th-Century Master Photographers

Some of the most enduring and powerful photographs of the 20th century, from Edward Steichen’s Gloria Swanson (1924) and André Kertész’s Chez Mondrian, Paris (1926) to Dorothea Lange’s Migrant Mother (1936) is on view together for the first time in the United States at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), in Viewpoints: Photographs from the Howard Greenberg Collection.

Featuring 150 prints from the Howard Greenberg Collection of Photographs—446 works recently acquired by the MFA—this exhibition showcases the breadth of the collection. Included are defining images from the 20th century made by many of the era’s most notable photographers, such as Dorothea Lange, Henri-Cartier Bresson, Gordon Parks and Robert Frank. The selection of highlights chosen for the exhibition reveals photography’s transformative power and examines its role in contributing to collective memories, celebrating the medium as an art form as well as a cultural, political and social force. In addition to exploring the historical importance of the photographs on view, Viewpoints highlights the material properties of these exceptional prints—many the first print of the image, the only print, or the best existing example.

On view through December 15, 2019 in the Lois B. and Michael K. Torf Gallery, the exhibition features a video interview with Greenberg and is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue produced by MFA Publications.

“I am truly thrilled and delighted to have the MFA as the recipient of my personal collection of photographs,” said Greenberg. “Assembled over 35 years and reflecting the unique access I’ve had to so many treasures of 20th-century photography, the collection will be in a perfect resting place at the MFA. The Museum’s enthusiasm for the results of my efforts has been unrelenting. The collection will be married to what is already a world-class museum collection, formed expertly and intently over a long period of time.”

“We are thrilled to be celebrating our acquisition of this unparalleled collection, which could not have been created by a collector other than Howard Greenberg,” said Kristen Gresh, Estrellita and Yousuf Karsh Senior Curator of Photographs. “It is a result of Howard’s role in the field of photography and his constant search for the transcendental moments found within this magical medium.”

Beginning with a selection of Greenberg’s particular favorites, photographs in Viewpoints are divided into seven themes: Capturing Modernism; Picturing the City; Conflicts and Crises; Bearing Witness; Fleeting Moments; Defining Portraits; and Music, Fashion and Celebrity. Below is a selection of highlights from the exhibition, accompanied by Greenberg’s own words about each print:

• Described by Greenberg as one of his “holy grail” photographs—and critical in his development as a collector—Consuelo Kanaga’s Young Girl in Profile (1948). This extraordinary print reveals her ability to make a portrait that conveys a person’s inner beauty, nobility and grace. Greenberg first encountered the image in 1984 when gathering work for an exhibition about the Photo League, ultimately borrowing the photograph from Lee Male of Ledel Gallery, who had a small print of the picture on consignment. “I began to fall in love with it and become obsessed. I begged her to ask the owner to sell it to me but he wouldn’t.” Eighteen years later, he received a call from a friend and gallery owner looking to sell none other than a print of the Kanaga image, previously owned by a woman who had known the artist.

• Mounted and signed, Edward Weston’s portrait of Mexican poet and painter Carmen Mondragón, Nahui Olin (1923) (meaning “four movements of the sun”). Weston tightly framed her head, resulting in an intense psychological study of her face and character. “It’s a famous portrait that has been published many times, but I had never seen a palladium print nor any print that looked like this. There is a reddish tinge around it … I always liked to think that somehow some of the clay of Mexico was rubbed into the surface of the print.”
• Edward Steichen’s Three Pears and an Apple, France (about 1921), made after the end of World War I when he retreated to the French countryside and devoted himself to experimenting with photography. “Steichen exposed the negative over a period of 36 hours, and everything, the pears and apple, the negative material, all swelled and contracted with the changes of temperature, affecting the focus. In awe, I salute Steichen’s unique talent by calling him an ‘alchemist.’” Another highlight of Steichen’s work in the exhibition is Gloria Swanson (1924).
• Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California (1936), Dorothea Lange’s\ tightly-framed, compassionate portrayal of the “hungry and desperate mother,” as the photographer has described her, at a pea-pickers camp on the Southern California coast. The image went on to be the most requested image at the Library of Congress and a recognized icon of the turmoil of the Great Depression. Lange intentionally removed the subject’s left thumb from the negative after 1939, which helps to date physical prints such as this one, which has a ghost thumb still visible in the lower right-hand corner.
• Known for his harmonious images of seized instants, Henri Cartier-Bresson was often influenced by Surrealist ideas regarding the unconscious; Madrid, Spain (1933) shows his sharp eye for spatial composition and fortuitous encounters. When he purchased the print, Greenberg did not think it was made in 1933 when the picture was taken: “But I didn’t care, it was very special, unusual print … so I bought it for myself.” In a visit to his gallery years later, Cartier-Bresson’s wife Martine Frank remarked, “You know Howard, I think this is one of his scrapbook prints … I have the feeling that it is the first print of the picture he ever made.” She later confirmed that it was indeed the first print he made of the picture.
• Powerhouse Mechanic (1924), one of Lewis W. Hine’s “worker portraits” that portrayed the human presence in modern industries. Through its formal construction and celebration of machinery and labor, the photograph has become emblematic of the industrial age. “My grandfather was a union organizer in the 30s, so I have that in my DNA a little bit, but Hine’s photo is not only a political picture for me. It is simply beautiful in every way. And it came to me in a beautiful way, as well.”
• Ralph Eugene Meatyard’s Fog (about 1955). “This is a graphically radical photograph … When looking closely at the dark forms of the window and shade, contrasted with the white outside, the tricycle slowly reveals itself. It almost appears alive. The transformation occurs while you are looking at it and from the first moment you see the tricycle, and faint signs of the house in the background, you see the magic. Few photographs have this special quality.”
• W. Eugene’s Smith’s Thelonious Monk (1959), an evocative portrait of one of the many jazz musicians he photographed, which was used on the cover of his album Monk in 1964. “I find great synergy between photography and rhythm and blues and jazz—they overlap in certain ways … Smith’s style was to make things dark and dramatic and when I saw this print, my knees shook. There is no way to describe it, you have to see it. It is transcendent.”
• Combining the animated geometry of the city with tender human interaction is Walker Evans’s Couple at Coney Island (1928). “This was an interesting picture for me because Evans is mostly known for his later, formalist photographs, works of wonderful precision and balance. That formal point of view was in part imposed by the nature of the large-format camera that he worked with. In the beginning, however, during the late twenties when this picture was taken, he was using a smaller, handheld camera … For many years I had this hanging at home next to the front door. Every day I would look at this picture—a couple delightfully dressed for a day in the park. I like pictures of people who like each other. I’m a romantic.”
• For Greenberg, André Kertész’s Chez Mondrian, Paris (1926) is “the perfect expression of the perfect photograph.” Kertész often made small prints on “carte postale” photographic paper that was intended for postcards; these are considered to be the artist’s finest prints, however this one is truly unique. The corners are slightly rounded because Kertész is said to have carried it around in his shirt pocket while trying to sell it.
• Aleksandr Rodchenko’s Pioneer with a Bugle (1930) displays the artist’s bold, graphic sensibility. With his diagonal compositions and radical foreshortening, Rodchenko—a Russian Constructivist committed to abstraction—added dynamic elements to his photography, paintings and graphic designs. This contact print made by the artist mounted on a card adds to its history and uniqueness.
• Co-founder of the New York Photo League, Sid Grossman sought to shift the role of documentary photography toward a more personal form of expression. A dynamic and joyous image, Coney Island (Couple Embracing) (1947) is a tightly-cropped photograph that transmits a feeling of post-war optimism. “I grew up two or three miles from Coney Island and on the weekends we’d go there … I love Sid’s photograph, it captures everything. It captures the joy. It captures the human compassion. The love and acceptance in the closeness of the people in the picture is very important to me. I know what that looked like from my own experience of Coney Island as a child.”
• Deeply influenced by his classes at the Photo League, Leon Levinstein took unsentimental photographs of city dwellers, graphically playing with lights and darks. In Handball Players, Houston Street, New York (1955), he transforms a court into a dynamic rhythmic dance, revealing raw and energetic gestures and textures of urban practices. “I have never seen a photographer, even to this day, who made the kind of pictures that he made where the human being becomes so distorted, so elongated or compressed. And he did this without resorting to any optical tricks. This picture was taken with a Rolleiflex camera and a normal lens. Leon knew how to get what he wanted.”

A passionate and discerning pillar in the field, Greenberg above all is a connoisseur. His own experience as a photographer and his early initiation into the world of the darkroom informs his recognition and appreciation of technical mastery, as well as his keen visual sense. Greenberg’s collection is closely related to his professional and personal relationships, which have allowed him special access to photographers’ archives and estates. He has played a key role in establishing the reputations of photographers whose technical and aesthetic contributions had previously been overlooked—including Louis Faurer, David Heath, Leon Levinstein, Saul Leiter and many others. Greenberg’s passion, sense of marvel and excitement of discovery are perhaps what most connect him to the photographs he chose to live with—expressive pictures that invite contemplation. For him, even the most seemingly straightforward photograph, through its composition, print quality and ability to evoke emotion, can transport the viewer to another place somewhere between the real and the abstract. This deeply personal and emotional connection with the objects adds a layer of humanity, intimacy, compassion and empathy to the collection, demonstrating his deep devotion, both personal and professional, to the field of photography.

The exhibition is accompanied by the catalogue Viewpoints: Photographs from the Howard Greenberg Collection (2019, MFA Publications), written by the exhibition curator Kristen Gresh and Anne E. Havinga, Estrellita and Yousuf Karsh Chair of Photography.

The acquisition and exhibition of the Howard Greenberg Collection of Photographs were made possible by the Phillip Leonian and Edith Rosenbaum Leonian Charitable Trust. Additional support for the exhibition from the Patricia B. Jacoby Exhibition Fund and The Bruce and Laura Monrad Fund for Exhibitions. Media Sponsor is Boston magazine.

The MFA possesses a pioneering photography collection, initiated in 1924 when Alfred Stieglitz donated 27 of his photographs to the Museum. Through purchase and by gift, the collection has grown to approximately 15,000 photographs, spanning the entire history of the medium from the 1840s to the present. Special strengths of the MFA’s holdings include daguerreotypes by Southworth and Hawes; sublime landscapes of the American West; turn-of-the-century Pictorialism; the Lane Collection (including Charles Sheeler’s entire photographic estate of nearly 2,500 works, an equal number of images by Edward Weston, more than 450 photographs by Ansel Adams and 100 works by Imogen Cunningham); European photography from between the wars (including the Sonja Bullaty and Angelo Lomeo Collection of Josef Sudek Photographs); European post-war Subjective photography; sizable groups of works by Harry Callahan and Emmet Gowin; mountain photographs by Bradford Washburn; portraits of internationally known figures by Yousuf Karsh; and fashion and celebrity images by Herb Ritts. The MFA consistently displays photography from its collection in special exhibitions, sharing works with the Museum’s visitors and wider audiences beyond Boston through publications and traveling exhibitions.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), is recognized for the quality and scope of its collection, representing all cultures and time periods. The Museum has more than 140 galleries displaying its encyclopedic collection, which includes Art of the Americas; Art of Europe; Contemporary Art; Art of Asia; Art of Africa and Oceania; Art of Ancient Greece and Rome; Art of Ancient Egypt, Nubia and the Near East; Prints and Drawings; Photography; Textile and Fashion Arts; and Musical Instruments. Open seven days a week, the MFA’s hours are Saturday through Tuesday, 10 am–5 pm; and Wednesday through Friday, 10 am–10 pm. Admission (which includes one repeat visit within 10 days) is $25 for adults and $23 for seniors and students age 18 and older, and includes entry to all galleries and special exhibitions. Opportunities for free and discounted admission for students, teachers, children, EBT card holders and military personnel and veterans can be found at mfa.org/visit, including free access for college students through the MFA’s University Membership and Pozen Community College Access program. The Museum is free for all after 4 pm every Wednesday and offers 11 free community celebrations annually. The Museum’s mobile MFA Guide is available at ticket desks and the Sharf Visitor Center for $5, members; $6, non-members; and $4, youths. The Museum is closed on New Year’s Day, Patriots’ Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. The MFA is located on the Avenue of the Arts at 465 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115. For more information, call 617.267.9300, visit mfa.org.

Women have long been the creative force behind Native American art; however, Hearts of Our People is the first major exhibition devoted solely to their work. This groundbreaking and comprehensive project features more than 115 objects—including traditional textiles, baskets, beadwork, and pottery, as well as painting, sculpture, video, and installation art—made by artists working in the United States and Canada from ancient times to the present day. Hearts of Our People is meant to be a tribute to all Native women artists, their families, and their nations, past and present. It is their minds, hearts, and hands that have birthed their worlds, and this exhibition, into being.

The exhibition planning process began with a question: Why do Native women make art? Organizers chose to respond within three core themes: Legacy, Relationships, and Power. Legacy examines the ways in which Native women artists acknowledge their lineage, making works that simultaneously embody the experience of previous generations, address the present moment, and speak to the future. Relationships explores the concept of bonds existing beyond the human world that include animals, nature, and other entities the non-Native world does not often recognize as having volition and agency. Power encompasses works created for diplomacy and influence, to empower others, and for the empowerment of oneself.

You will see similarities across cultures and communities, but you will also see many differences. Native Americans are not a single monolithic group, and each tribe, nation, or community has its own unique culture, history, and present moment. Perhaps most important, each Native artist, like artists the world over, brings her own life experience, skill, and individual style to her art.

The co-curators of this exhibition are Jill Ahlberg Yohe, associate curator of Native American art at Minneapolis Institute of Art, and Teri Greeves, Kiowa artist and scholar. Special recognition goes to Dakota Hoska, Lakȟóta, research assistant. During each step of the curatorial process, they worked closely with an Exhibition Advisory Board to develop the major themes of the exhibition and advise on object selection. The board was also instrumental in determining the structure and content of the exhibition catalogue and related programming.

The Hearts of Our People Exhibition Advisory Board members include: heather ahtone, Choctaw/Chickasaw, senior curator, American Indian Cultural Center and Museum, Oklahoma City; D. Y. Begay, Navajo artist, Santa Fe; Janet Berlo, professor of art history and visual and cultural studies, University of Rochester; Susan Billy, Pomo artist, Ukiah, California; Katie Bunn-Marcuse, director and managing editor, Bill Holm Center for the Study of Northwest Coast Art, Burke Museum, Seattle; Christina Burke, curator, Native American and non-Western art, Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa; Kelly Church, Anishinaabe artist and educator, Michigan; Heid Erdrich, Ojibwe writer and curator, Minneapolis; Anita Fields, Osage artist, Tulsa; Adriana Greci Green, curator, Indigenous arts of the Americas, The Fralin Museum of Art at the University of Virginia; Carla Hemlock, Mohawk artist, Kahnewake; Graci Horne, Dakȟóta, independent curator, Minneapolis; Nadia Jackinsky, Alutiiq art historian, Anchorage; America Meredith, Cherokee, publishing editor of First American Art Magazine, Oklahoma City; Nora Naranjo Morse, Santa Clara artist, Española; Cherish Parrish, Anishinaabe artist and educator, University of Michigan; Ruth Phillips, Canada Research Professor and professor of art history, Carleton University; Jolene K. Rickard, Tuscarora, artist and associate professor of the history of art and visual studies, Cornell University; Lisa Telford, Haida artist, Seattle; and Dyani White Hawk, Sičháŋğu Lakȟóta (Brulé) artist and curator, Minneapolis.

Related Programs

• Hearts and Hands: New Perspectives on Native Women’s Art Fri, Sep 27, 2019
• Studio Workshop: Beaded Medallions Sat, Oct 12, 2019
• Free Family Festival Day Sun, Oct 27, 2019
• Curator’s Tour: NATIVE WOMEN ARTISTS Thu, Oct 31, 2019
• Food for Thought: HEARTS OF OUR PEOPLE Tue, Nov 12, 2019
• Educator Workshop: Legacy, Relationships, and Power—The Artistry of Native Women Thu, Nov 14, 2019
• Artist’s Perspective: Rose B. Simpson Thu, Nov 14, 2019
• Making Memories: HEARTS OF OUR PEOPLE Fri, Nov 15, 2019
• Educator Workshop: Native Women Artists—Shaping and Responding to History Sat, Nov 16, 2019
• Gallery Talk: Native American Basketry and Sovereignty Thu, Nov 21, 2019
• Film: TE ATA Sun, Dec 8, 2019

Now On View Through May 3, 2021 in the Art of the Americas Wing, Level 3, Exhibition Includes Works Across Media by more than 100 Women Artists

For centuries, women-identified artists have struggled to receive recognition for their accomplishments. Despite more than a century of feminist activism and great strides towards social, professional and political equality, women remain dramatically underrepresented and undervalued in the art world today. In response, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), has reinstalled the entire third floor of its Art of the Americas Wing with approximately 200 artworks made by women over the last 100 years—a “takeover” that aims to challenge the dominant history of art from 1920 to 2020 and shine a light on some of the many talented and determined women artists who deserve attention. The thematic exhibition coincides with the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote, as well as the MFA’s 150th anniversary—a yearlong celebration focused on enhancing the power of art and artists, honoring the past and re-imagining the future.

Women Take the Floor seeks to acknowledge and remedy the systemic gender discrimination found in museums, galleries, the academy and the marketplace, including the MFA’s inconsistent history in supporting women artists. The exhibition also explores art and suffrage—emphasizing that both could give women a voice in their community and the world. At the same time, it recognizes that past feminist movements, including the campaign for the right to vote, were not inclusive or immune from systemic racism. By looking at 20th-century American art through the lens of modern-day feminism—which advocates for equity and intersectionality (the way an individual’s race, class, gender and other identities combine and overlap)—MFA curators hope to broaden the stories that are told during the yearlong commemoration of women’s suffrage in 2020.

Primarily drawn from the MFA’s collection, the works featured in Women Take the Floor include paintings, sculpture, prints, photographs, jewelry, textiles, ceramics and furniture. The central gallery, dedicated to portraits of women created by women, provides a large convening space where visitors are invited to share perspectives and participate in a wide range of programs scheduled to take place throughout the run of the exhibition. Women Take the Floor is on view through May 3, 2021. Sponsored by Bank of America. Generously supported by the Carl and Ruth Shapiro Family Foundation. Additional support from the Jean S. and Frederic A. Sharf Exhibition Fund, and the Eugenie Prendergast Memorial Fund.

“Our goals are to celebrate the strength and diversity of work by women artists while also shining a light on the ongoing struggle that many continue to face today. We see these efforts of recognition and empowerment to mark a first step to redress the systematic discrimination against women at the MFA, and within the art world,” said Nonie Gadsden, Katharine Lane Weems Senior Curator of American Decorative Arts and Sculpture, who led a cross-departmental team of curators in organizing Women Take the Floor.

Gadsden coordinated a cross-departmental curatorial team for the exhibition, including Reto Thüring, Beal Family Chair, Department of Contemporary Art; Erica Hirshler, Croll Senior Curator of American Paintings; Lauren Whitley, Senior Curator of Textiles and Fashion Arts; Patrick Murphy, Lia and William Poorvu Assistant Curator of Prints and Drawings and Supervisor, Morse Study Room; Karen Haas, Lane Senior Curator of Photographs; and former MFA Curatorial Research Associates Caroline Kipp, Emelie Gevalt and Zoë Samels.

To ensure the exhibition represented a broad range of perspectives, the MFA convened a roundtable discussion with local women community leaders to inform interpretation and give feedback on the project, particularly on the Women Depicting Women gallery. As a result, outside voices are a key feature of the central space, and informed interpretation throughout the exhibition. Porsha Olayiwola, the current poet laureate for the city of Boston, will write a new poem and perform it on video, and the local feminist collective The Cauldron has identified quotes from feminist voices, which will be featured in the entry space.

The core space of the exhibition focuses on Women Depicting Women: Her Vision, Her Voice. The works on view range across time and place, as well as social, political and cultural contexts, yet all represent a highly individual interpretation of female portraiture. Highlights throughout the run of the exhibition will include celebrated paintings by Frida Kahlo, Alice Neel and Loïs Mailou Jones; photographs by Andrea Bowers, Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, Laura McPhee and Cindy Sherman; and the recently acquired portrait of feminist activist Rosemary Mayer by Sylvia Sleigh.

In the decades following the campaign for women’s suffrage, a greater number of women successfully pursued careers as professional artists and designers. Yet the road was not easy—nor was it open to all. Women on the Move: Art and Design in the 1920s and 30s in the John Axelrod Gallery considers the contributions of pioneering artists like painters Georgia O’Keeffe and Loïs Mailou Jones and ceramicists Maria Martinez (San Ildefonso Pueblo) and Maija Grotell. At the same time, the gallery highlights works by important women artists who have garnered less recognition, including sculptor Meta Warrick Fuller, painter Helen Torr and potter Nampeyo (Hopi-Tewa).

No Man’s Land, on view in the Melvin Blake and Frank Purnell Gallery, is devoted to six artists who have each reimagined the representation of landscape, creating personal interpretations of the world around them. Working across decades, geographies and media, Luchita Hurtado, Doris Lindo Lewis, Loren MacIver, Georgia O’Keeffe, Beverly Pepper and Kay Sage explored the metaphoric possibilities of both real and imagined landscapes, often through the use of symbols that allude to female experiences.

Presented in the Saundra B. and William H. Lane Galleries, Beyond the Loom: Fiber as Sculpture highlights pioneering artists who radically redefined textiles as modern art in the 1960s and 1970s: Anni Albers, Olga de Amaral, Ruth Asawa, Sheila Hicks, Kay Sekimachi and Lenore Tawney. Co-opting a medium traditionally associated with women’s work and domesticity, they boldly broke free from the constraints of the loom to create large-scale, sculptural weavings that engaged with contemporary art movements such as Minimalism. A second rotation in the same space, Subversive Threads, will open late spring 2020, focusing on contemporary artists who have used textiles to challenge notions of identity, gender and politics.

Women of Action, on view in the Saundra B. and William H. Lane Galleries, builds on recent scholarship and recognizes the contributions of Joan Mitchell, Grace Hartigan, Helen Frankenthaler, Elaine de Kooning, Lee Krasner and ceramicist Toshiko Takaezu to the formation and expansion of action painting in the mid-20th century, a movement typically credited to their male counterparts.

Women Publish Women: The Print Boom celebrates three entrepreneurs who founded printmaking workshops in the late 1950s and 1960s and played an underappreciated role in the revitalization of American printmaking: Tatyana Grosman of Universal Limited Art Editions (New York), June Wayne of Tamarind Lithography (Los Angeles) and Kathan Brown of Crown Point Press (San Francisco). These will be presented in two rotations in the Robert and Jane Burke Gallery. The third rotation, Personal to Political: Women Photographers, 1965–1985, will feature work by more than 35 photographers active during these pivotal decades when women were making major inroads into the fields of photojournalism, fashion, social documentary and fine art photography.

Women and Abstraction at Midcentury takes an expansive look at abstraction, exploring how women artists reshaped the natural world for expressive purposes in a wide range of media including paintings, prints, textiles, ceramics, furniture and jewelry. Among the artists featured in this space are painters Carmen Herrera, Esphyr Slobodkina and Maud Morgan; designers Greta Magnusson-Grossman and Olga Lee; and Clare Falkenstein, Laura Andreson, Margaret de Patta and others who contributed to the development of the studio craft movement.

The exhibition will also include a space for reflection and feedback. In addition to a video of Olayiwola performing her newly commissioned poem, a curated bookshelf—including texts on feminist history and women artists—and a seating area will be available for visitors. Additionally, curators will select responses left by the public in an open feedback area to add to the in-gallery interpretation in Women Depicting Women—creating a dynamic “living label” that will grow throughout the installation’s 18-month run.

A selection of speeches will be available in conjunction with Amalia Pica’s Now Speak! (2011)—a cast concrete lectern that encourages visitors to make spontaneous declarations or deliver a performance of a historical speech. The texts were chosen by C. Payal Sharma, an independent racial equity and justice consultant based in Boston. A “living artwork,” Now Speak! will also serve as the centerpiece of various public programs taking place in the gallery.

Public Programming

Public programming in the space will include a Creative Residency with ImprovBoston in October, as well as Artist Demonstrations with painter Joann Rothschild (September 15), weaver Nathalie Miebach (October 13 and 16) and printmaker Carolyn Muskat (November 10 and 13). On October 9, violinist Ceren Turkmenoglu will perform a program of works by Ottoman-Turkish women composers of Turkish classical music, spanning form past to recent times. Public tours of the exhibition include an hour-long “Curated Conversation” with exhibition curator Nonie Gadsden on September 29, and 15-minute Spotlight Talks on October 9.

Feminist Art Coalition

With Women Take the Floor, the MFA is participating in the Feminist Art Coalition (FAC), working collectively with various art museums and nonprofit institutions across the U.S. to present a series of concurrent events in the fall of 2020—during the run-up to the next presidential election—that take feminist thought and practice as their point of departure. Fellow participants include Art21; CCA Wattis Institute of Contemporary Art; Center for Curatorial Studies, Hessel Museum of Art, Bard College; The Curtis R. Priem Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC), RPI; Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; MIT List Visual Arts Center; The Renaissance Society, Art Institute of Chicago; UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA); and the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA).

Art of the Americas at the MFA

Since the Museum’s founding in 1870, it has been committed to collecting art of North, Central and South America from all time periods. Its diverse holdings rank among the most significant in the nation and feature masterpieces ranging from gold of the Ancient Americas, Maya ceramics, and Native American (prehistoric to contemporary) objects, to one of the finest collections of art of the United States from colonial through modern times. Additionally, the MFA’s Art the Americas collection contains more than 13,000 examples of American decorative arts (furniture, silver, ceramics, glass and metalwork) and sculpture made across the Americas from the 17th century to the present––embracing masterworks of artisan and artist alike. More than 5,000 objects from the Museum’s collection of works from the Americas are on view in the 49 galleries of the Art of the Americas Wing, as well as in the Sargent Rotunda and Colonnade. Also displayed in these galleries are works from the Americas drawn from the Museum’s Prints and Drawings; Photography; Textile and Fashion Arts; and Musical Instruments collections.

Andrew Roberts, John Monsky, Bob & Dolores Hope Foundation to be Honored at New-York Historical Society’s Annual History Makers Gala Tuesday, October 29, 2019

The New-York Historical Society will present the 2019 History Makers Award to historian Andrew Roberts, author of the acclaimed book, Churchill: Walking with Destiny. The gala will take place on October 29, 2019, at Cipriani 42nd Street. New-York Historical Trustee John Monsky will receive the New-York Historical Society Distinguished Service Award, and the Bob & Dolores Hope Foundation will receive the New-York Historical Society Medal of Merit for Public Engagement.

“D-Day was the pivotal moment of World War II and arguably the single most important morning of the 20th century,” said Pam Schafler, chair of New-York Historical’s Board of Trustees. “This year’s honorees have each played a crucial role in illuminating that moment in history, which celebrates its 75th anniversary this year. Andrew Roberts’ book, Churchill: Walking with Destiny, makes it clear that there likely would never have been a D-Day without Churchill’s fierce, and often solitary, obstinacy. Bob Hope was the personification of the American ‘good heart’ and ‘good friendship’ that kept soldiers in the fight and home front audiences confident and supportive. John Monsky, through his singular D-Day multi-media program, has brought that fateful day, and the weeks and months that followed, to life.”

The funds raised at the History Makers Gala benefit education programs at New-York Historical that annually serve more than 200,000 New York City public school students. Past recipients of the History Makers Award include Jim Dale (2018), William J. Bratton and Rikki Klieman (2017), Ken Burns and Ric Burns (2016), Ron Chernow and Lin-Manuel Miranda (2015), Hillary Clinton (2014), David Petraeus (2013), Wynton Marsalis and Walter Isaacson (2012), and Henry Kissinger (2011), among others.

2019 Honorees

Andrew Roberts has written or edited 12 books, which have been translated into 18 languages, and appears regularly on radio and television around the world. His biography of Sir Winston Churchill, Churchill: Walking with Destiny, was published fall 2018 and entered the New York Times bestseller list after being described by the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and several British papers as the best biography of Churchill ever written. Based in London, he is an accomplished public speaker. He is presently a Visiting Professor at the War Studies Department at King’s College, London; the Lehrman Institute Lecturer at the New-York Historical Society; and the Founder-President of the Cliveden Literary Festival.

John Monsky is a historian, writer, producer, lecturer, and lawyer. A trustee of the New-York Historical Society, he is the creator, writer, executive producer, and narrator of the American History Unbound series. He is also known for his collection of American flags—one of the finest in the United States. His day job is at Oak Hill Capital Partners, a private equity firm founded by Robert M. Bass, where he serves as partner, General Counsel, and Chairman of the Social, Environmental, and Governance Committee.

The Bob & Dolores Hope Foundation was established to provide for and to assure the continuation of the philanthropic ideals of Bob and Dolores Hope by supporting organizations that feed, clothe, and shelter America’s underprivileged. It also honors and preserves the “spirit of Bob Hope” and his legacy as an entertainer, comedian, patriot, humanitarian, and supporter of U.S. military service members.

Gala chairs include Helen and Robert Appel, Diana and Joe DiMenna, Leonard and Judy Lauder, Jennifer Weis Monsky, Pam and Scott Schafler, Denise and Bernard L. Schwartz, and Leah and Michael Weisberg. Co-chairs include Nancy and Barry C. Barnett; Norman S. Benzaquen; Lois Chiles and Richard Gilder; Elizabeth B. Dater; Buzzy Geduld; Ahuva and Martin J. Gross; Susan and Roger Hertog; Patricia D. Klingenstein; Barbara K. and Ira A. Lipman; Paula and Tom McInerney; Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP; Suzanne Peck and Brian Friedman; Jean Margo Reid; Richard Reiss; Leslie and Alan Shuch; Michelle Smith; Gillian and Robert Steel; Laurie and Sy Sternberg; Ann and Andrew Tisch; Sue Ann Weinberg; Anita and Byron Wien; and Barbara and David Zalaznick. Vice chairs include Victoria and Travis Anderson; Judy and Howard Berkowitz; Franci Blassberg and Joseph Rice; Blavatnik Family Foundation; Bob & Dolores Hope Foundation; Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP; Ruth and Sid Lapidus; Louise and Lewis Lehrman; Joseph C. McNay; Abby and Jonathan Moses; Oak Hill Capital; Joan and Joel I. Picket; Donna and Marvin Schwartz; Paul E. Singer; Daria and Eric J. Wallach; and Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP.

What : Annual History Makers Gala

When: Tuesday, October 29, 2019

Cocktails: 6 pm | Dinner and Program: 7 pm

Where: Cipriani 42nd Street, 110 East 42nd Street New York City

Tickets: $1,500 Chartwell Ticket

$2,500 Ally Ticket$5,000 Victory Ticket

$15,000 Churchill Table

$25,000 Vice Chair Table

$50,000 Co-Chair Table

$100,000 Chairman’s Table

For more information or to purchase tickets, contact: 212-744-0799 or barbi@barbizakinevents.com.

Founded in 1804, the New-York Historical Society has a mission to explore the richly layered history of New York City, state, and the country, as well as to serve as a national forum for the discussion of issues surrounding the making and meaning of history. New-York Historical is recognized for engaging the public with deeply researched and far-ranging exhibitions, such as Alexander Hamilton: The Man Who Made Modern America; Slavery in New York; Nueva York; Chinese American: Exclusion/Inclusion; Superheroes in Gotham; Walk This Way: Footwear from the Stuart Weitzman Collection of Historic Shoes; Harry Potter: A History of Magic; and Black Citizenship in the Age of Jim Crow. Supporting these exhibitions and related education programs is one of the world’s greatest collections of historical artifacts, works of American art, and other materials documenting the history of the United States and New York. New-York Historical is also home to one of the oldest, most distinguished libraries in the nation—the Patricia D. Klingenstein Library, which contains more than three million books, pamphlets, maps, newspapers, music sheets, manuscripts, prints, photographs, and architectural drawings.

Debut of New Works by International Designers Ini Archibong, Matt Checkowski, Misha Kahn, the Ladd Brothers Laurie Haycock Makela, and Yuri Suzuki

speechless: different by design Opens at the Dallas Museum of Art in November 2019, Travels to the High Museum of Art in April 2020

The High Museum of Art (High) (Atlanta, Ga.) and the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) (Dallas, Texas) announced the co-organization of speechless: different by design, an exhibition that merges research, aesthetics, and innovative new design to explore the vast spectrum of sensory experiences and new approaches to accessibility and modes of communication in the museum setting. Speechless will debut new work by six leading and emerging international designers and design teams—Ini Archibong, Matt Checkowski, Misha Kahn, Steven and William Ladd, Laurie Haycock Makela, and Yuri Suzuki—whose projects were informed by conversations with specialists from prominent academic and medical institutions. Their site-specific installations and new commissions will create participatory environments and distinct situations in which senses merge or are substituted for one another.

Curated by Sarah Schleuning, The Margot B. Perot Senior Curator of Decorative Arts and Design and Interim Chief Curator at the DMA, speechless will open at the DMA on November 10, 2019, and remain on view through February 23, 2020. The exhibition is presented in Dallas by Texas Instruments. The High will present the exhibition in Atlanta from April 25 through September 6, 2020.

“This exhibition is about blurring the boundaries between senses, media, disciplines, and environments to encourage visitors to interact and communicate through design,” said Schleuning. “speechless is about what makes us as individuals unique—the challenges we experience through ourselves and others—ultimately defining the interconnections among all of us. Our perceptions, experiences, and differences should unite us instead of divide us, heightening our understandings and creating a greater sense of empathy in ourselves and our community.”

“Sarah Schleuning began to develop this important project while serving as our curator of decorative arts and design, so it feels very fitting, and full circle, to co-organize this exhibition with our esteemed colleagues at the DMA,” said Rand Suffolk, Nancy and Holcombe T. Green, Jr., Director of the High. “This exhibition dovetails perfectly with our ongoing and evolving commitment to access. Consequently, we’re excited to welcome audiences with wide-ranging abilities to experience these unique and immersive installations. We hope to learn something important about how such a diverse group of visitors interacts with these works as well as engages with each other within the spaces.”

“The DMA is committed to offering our audiences opportunities for discovery and for learning about different perspectives and cultures through our exhibitions and collections, and the intersections between them,” said Agustín Arteaga, the DMA’s Eugene McDermott Director. “In line with this approach, Sarah’s work on this groundbreaking project—involving years of cross-disciplinary study and collaboration with designers, scholars, and scientists at the forefront of innovation in art and accessibility—is truly pioneering within our field and creates an incredible opportunity to provide a truly distinct museum experience to our audiences. We are pleased to partner with the High in presenting speechless, an exhibition that creates meaningful experiences for visitors of all backgrounds and abilities, and also contributes important scholarship and insight about how museums can innovate with everything from installation to the visitor experience.”

About the Artists

Ini Archibong was born and raised in Pasadena, California, where he graduated from the Art Center College of Design. After a period living and working in Singapore and traveling widely, he moved to Switzerland, where he is currently based, to pursue further studies in luxury design and craftsmanship and received a master’s degree from École cantonale d’art de Lausanne (ECAL). He has designed furniture for such luxury brands as Hermès, de Sede, Bernhardt Design, Ruinart, Christofle and Vacheron Constantin. He is currently collaborating with the Friedman Benda Gallery in New York and Sé Collections in London, with whom he released the second installment of the Below the Heavens during this year’s Salone del Mobile in Milan.

Matt Checkowski is a designer and filmmaker based in Los Angeles. He has served as the creative force behind the dream sequences in Steven Spielberg’s Minority Report; The Sensorium, a first-of-its-kind interactive perfume museum in New York; and the digital media content for a science fiction opera at l’Opera de Monte Carlo; and he was the co-director of Lies & Alibis, a feature film starring Steve Coogan, Sam Elliott, James Marsden, and Rebecca Romijn. In 2006 Checkowski established the Department of the 4th Dimension, a multi-disciplinary studio working at the intersection of storytelling, technology, and branding with clients that include the Walker Art Center, MIT, Victoria’s Secret, Sephora, Unilever, Electrolux, and the University of California. His work has been profiled in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, Wired, and Popular Science, among others.

Misha Kahn was born in Duluth, Minnesota, and graduated from the Rhode Island school of Design with a BFA in furniture design in 2011. His work exists at the intersection of design and sculpture, exploring a wide variety of media and scales from mouse to house. Kahn’s approach melds an array of processes, from casting, carving, welding, and weaving, to imaginative and singular modes of production. According to former president of the Rhode Island School of Design John Maeda, “Misha creates work for a parallel wonderland, where traditional perception of material and structure is pushed to the edges of the room to make space for one big party.” His work has been exhibited internationally and is in the permanent collection of numerous museums and public collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and the Corning Museum of Glass.

Brothers Steven and William Ladd have created multi–disciplinary works combining sculpture, performance, design, and social activism since they began collaborating in 2000. They have exhibited at the Musée des arts décoratifs and had solo exhibitions at numerous American institutions, including their hometown institution the Saint Louis Art Museum. Their work is labor-intensive and has varied from large three-dimensional murals to book bindings. Through their Scrollathon® they have worked with over 7,000 people, including children, hospital patients, and special needs individuals. Their work is in the collections of the Musée des arts décoratifs at the Louvre, the Honolulu Museum of Art, the Corning Museum of Glass, and Mingei International Museum.

Laurie Haycock Makela has been a recognized voice of experimental graphic and trans-disciplinary design practice and education for over 30 years in the United States and Europe. She has taught at prestigious institutions in Sweden, Germany, and Los Angeles. She was designer-in-residence and co-chair of the department of 2-D design at the Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, from 1996 to 2001 with the late P. Scott Makela. Their studio, Words and Pictures for Business and Culture, produced print and new media for clients such as NIKE, MTV and Warner Bros. She was awarded the AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Arts) Medal, the profession’s highest honor, in 2000.  Most recently, she became the first designer-in-residence at USC’s Roski School of Art and Design.

Yuri Suzuki is a sound artist, designer, and electronic musician who explores the realms of sound through exquisitely designed pieces. His work looks into the way people experience sound, and how music and sound affect their minds. His sound, art, and installations have been internationally exhibited and he has work in several permanent collections across the world. He began his own design studio in 2013, working alongside Disney, Google, and Yamaha, among others.  

Harnessing the power and impact of design, speechless offers audiences unconventional multisensory experiences that foster understanding of the varied ways in which we experience the world through our senses. The exhibition presents opportunities for new modes of communicating ideas beyond speech and words. Organized in five major sections, the exhibition is connected by a central introductory space and sensory de-escalation area, through which visitors must pass to move between sections. Six contemporary designers will create spaces that fuse multiple sensory experiences—for instance, rendering sound visible or language tactile. The works include:

• The Oracle, designed and engineered by California-born, Switzerland-based multi-disciplinary designer Ini Archibong, will explore non-traditional ways of experiencing sound. The space occupied by Archibong’s work will be infused with a soothing, harmonious soundscape created by a custom synthesizer, which removes discordant sound and produces pure sound waves. The installation will feature an array of interactive elements designed to illustrate sound through movement, shape, light, and color, including a pool with an obelisk that visitors can rotate to tune the sound to various bass tones, thereby changing the shape and movement of the water as well; and brass pedestals holding handblown glass shapes that pivot to initiate shifts in light and color. Visitors can turn every element throughout the room to communally alter the sound in the space.

• Glyph, by designer and filmmaker Matt Checkowski, will explore the creativity behind each designer’s work in speechless and the role of empathy that informs it through a series of narrative and intimate short film portraits of each artist. He is developing a method of word and image translation whereby the filmed speech of each artist will be transformed live into images, offering a new, universal visual language for the ideas conveyed by the creative minds involved with this project.
• Brooklyn-based designer and artist Misha Kahn will create a meandering coral garden composed of vibrant, dynamic inflatables that will move in multiple ways, inflating and deflating over the course of each day. Visitors can touch, sit, squeeze, and otherwise interact with the inflatable forms, both observing the landscape change around them and themselves participating in the alteration.
• Scroll Space, presented by New York–based brothers and artists Steven and William Ladd, will be a vibrant and tactile room created entirely of tens of thousands of hand-rolled textile “scrolls.” These scrolls will be made in collaboration with 2,000 community members in Dallas and Atlanta through the Ladd Brothers’ community engagement program Scrollathon®, which brings the arts to underserved populations through hands-on creative workshops. The Dallas program will include participants from the Center for BrainHealth and the Callier Center for Communication Disorders at the University of Texas at Dallas.
• The exhibition’s graphic identity and corresponding publication speechless: Beyond Sense  is created by Laurie Haycock Makela, a leader in the field of experimental, transdisciplinary graphic design. Playing with the multiple meanings of the word “speechless,” the publication will explore the evolution of the project, document the installations, and feature conversations between the designers and the curator. Both innovative and accessible, her work contributes to the foundation of total inclusive and interactive experience of the project.
• Sound Of The Earth Chapter 2, a sound installation by London-based sound artist and designer Yuri Suzuki, will integrate audio crowdsourced from around the world. The work will take the form of a spherical sculpture with which visitors can interact by placing their ears against the surface. Each spot on the sphere represents a different area of the world and will “whisper” back a corresponding sound sourced from that region, enabling visitors to experience the globe in a fresh way, beyond text and words. Anyone around the world can submit audio via the DMA’s website at earthsounds.dma.org.

speechless is organized by the Dallas Museum of Art and the High Museum of Art, Atlanta. The exhibition in Dallas is presented by Texas Instruments.

Support for the exhibition in Atlanta is provided by wish foundation. This exhibition in Atlanta is made possible by Exhibition Series Sponsors Delta Air Lines, Inc., Northside Hospital, and WarnerMedia; Premier Exhibition Series Supporters the Antinori Foundation, Sarah and Jim Kennedy, and Louise Sams and Jerome Grilhot; Benefactor Exhibition Series Supporter Anne Cox Chambers Foundation; Ambassador Exhibition Series Supporters Tom and Susan Wardell, and Rod Westmoreland; and Contributing Exhibition Series Supporters Lucinda W. Bunnen, Marcia and John Donnell, W. Daniel Ebersole and Sarah Eby-Ebersole, Peggy Foreman, Robin and Hilton Howell, Mr. and Mrs. Baxter Jones, Margot and Danny McCaul, Joel Knox and Joan Marmo, and The Ron and Lisa Brill Family Charitable Trust.

Generous support is also provided by the Alfred and Adele Davis Exhibition Endowment Fund, Anne Cox Chambers Exhibition Fund, Barbara Stewart Exhibition Fund, Dorothy Smith Hopkins Exhibition Endowment Fund, Eleanor McDonald Storza Exhibition Endowment Fund, The Fay and Barrett Howell Exhibition Fund, Forward Arts Foundation Exhibition Endowment Fund, Helen S. Lanier Endowment Fund, Isobel Anne Fraser–Nancy Fraser Parker Exhibition Endowment Fund, John H. and Wilhelmina D. Harland Exhibition Endowment Fund, Katherine Murphy Riley Special Exhibition Endowment Fund, Margaretta Taylor Exhibition Fund, and the RJR Nabisco Exhibition Endowment Fund.

The Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) will present two solo exhibitions debuting new works by Canadian painter Wanda Koop and Brazilian artist Sandra Cinto. Concentrations 62: Wanda Koop, Dreamline, the first US solo museum exhibition for the artist, will feature eight new paintings from her Dreamline series of landscapes. Sandra Cinto: Landscape of a Lifetime will occupy the Concourse hall with a commissioned immersive mural. These internationally exhibited artists share an interest in the natural world: Koop investigates how urban society and the environment intersect, while Cinto combines drawing and painting to create intricate installations that evoke voyages through sea and space.

“The DMA’s Concentrations series and Concourse hall mural space serve as platforms for innovative contemporary artists to share new work with our audiences,” said Dr. Agustín Arteaga, the DMA’s Eugene McDermott Director. “Through the distinct perspectives each artist brings to their projects, the DMA builds on its outstanding contemporary art programming and exhibitions. We especially look forward to introducing Koop and Cinto to local and national audiences as part of a continuing commitment by the DMA to spotlight women artists.”

Over the past two years, the DMA has presented eleven solo and group exhibitions of work by women artists, including, most recently, Women + Design: New Works; Women Artists in Europe from the Monarchy to Modernism; Ida O’Keeffe: Escaping Georgia’s Shadow; Berthe Morisot, Woman Impressionist; and Sheila Hicks: Secret Structures, Looming Presence.

For Concentrations 62, Koop will debut eight new works in her Dreamline series, accompanied by more than 20 preparatory paintings from the past two decades. Koop’s richly colored canvases straddle abstraction and figuration, the real and the imagined, the personal and the political.

Titled Dreamline after an airplane model, the series consists of paintings whose perspective resembles the view from an airplane window, looking out at sparsely populated worlds. The land- and cityscapes are unnaturally hued and are disrupted by drips of paint that recall windowpanes and tear drops, suggesting the uncertain relationship between humankind and nature. The exhibition opens on October 20 and will be on view through February 2, 2020.

Wanda Koop, Dreamline is part of the Museum’s Concentrations series of exhibitions that presents a recently completed body of work or site-specific installation by an emerging artist, generally as their first US solo museum exhibition. The series began in 1981 as part of the DMA’s commitment to the work of living artists and has staged the first major museum exhibition for many of the most established artists working today, including Doug Aitken, Shirin Neshat, Anri Sala, Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla, Phil Collins, Karla Black, and Slavs and Tatars, among many others.

Sandra Cinto will transform the Concourse hall with Landscape of a Lifetime, a 153-foot mural covering the walls and ceiling in 24 shades of blue, shifting from dark to light to give the impression of the transition from night to day. Viewers will be immersed in a lyrical landscape of intricately hand-drawn lines and celestial forms, punctuated by canvases with the same motifs rendered in gorgeous detail. Low-level audio of sounds recorded by the artist (running water, rustling leaves, birds, etc.) played in the Concourse will further enhance the artist’s investigation of life and natural cycles. The exhibition opens on November 15 and will be on view through July 5, 2020.

Both exhibitions are curated by Dr. Anna Katherine Brodbeck, Hoffman Family Senior Curator of Contemporary Art. “I am thrilled to share the work of Wanda Koop and Sandra Cinto with our audiences this fall. These veteran international artists offer poetic reflections on the interconnection between humans and nature. Their works celebrate the beauty of the world around us while also making us more aware of our impact on and place within that world, a lesson with particular resonance for us today.”

Visitors can hear from the artists during these upcoming public programs:

Sunday, October 20, 3:00 p.m., Tickets $5, FREE for DMA Members and Students
Artist Talk: Wanda Koop
Join us for the opening day of the new exhibition Wanda Koop: Dreamline and hear the artist talk about her work with DMA curator Dr. Katherine Brodbeck and Robert Enright, editor of the quarterly cultural magazine Border Crossings.

Wednesday, November 6, 12:15 p.m., FREE
Gallery Talk: Sandra Cinto: Landscape of a Lifetime
Artist Sandra Cinto will talk about her new site-specific mural at the DMA, Landscape of a Lifetime.

Beginning October 28, visitors will be able to watch Cinto as she works over three weeks to complete the mural.

Concentrations 62: Wanda Koop, Dreamline and Sandra Cinto: Landscape of a Lifetime are organized by the Dallas Museum of Art and are included in free general admission. These presentations are made possible by the TWO x TWO for AIDS and Art Fund and by the DMA Contemporary Art Initiative. The Dallas Museum of Art is supported, in part, by the generosity of DMA Members and donors, the citizens of Dallas through the City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs, and the Texas Commission on the Arts.

Established in 1903, the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) is among the 10 largest art museums in the country and is distinguished by its commitment to research, innovation, and public engagement. At the heart of the Museum and its programs is its global collection, which encompasses 25,000 works and spans 5,000 years of history, representing a full range of world cultures. Located in the nation’s largest arts district, the Museum acts as a catalyst for community creativity, engaging people of all ages and backgrounds with a diverse spectrum of programming, from exhibitions and lectures to concerts, literary events, and dramatic and dance presentations. Since the Museum’s return to free general admission in 2013, the DMA has welcomed more than 4 million visitors, including more than 800,000 in 2018. For more information, visit DMA.org.

Enhancing the Power of Art and Artists with a Renewed Focus on the Community in Which We Live

The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), has announced a slate of initiatives for its 150th anniversary in 2020, driven by a deepened commitment to inclusion, community and generosity. The yearlong celebration aims to bring more people closer to art and the MFA—signaling aspirations for the Museum’s future.

“The MFA’s 150th anniversary is a moment to honor our past and, more critically, anticipate our future. The Museum was founded with a spirit of generosity and belief in the power of art and artists—values that remain among the pillars of today’s MFA,” said Matthew Teitelbaum, Ann and Graham Gund Director. “As we look ahead, we must also address the changing role of museums in society, amplifying our efforts toward becoming a truly inclusive institution and committing to a new sense of urgency in engaging with the issues of our time.”

A group of Boston’s civic leaders created the Museum in 1870 as a public place for discovery, the enjoyment of art and celebration of artists. Since then, the MFA has grown to house a global collection, which will be highlighted during the 150th anniversary year in exhibitions ranging from Ancient Nubia Now, shining a light on the powerful, yet historically misinterpreted kingdoms on the Nile, to the Weng Family Collection of Chinese Painting: Family and Friends, featuring works by some of the greatest masters from the Ming (1368–1644) and Qing (1644–1911) dynasties, to Lucian Freud: The Self-Portraits, organized in partnership with the Royal Academy of Arts in London. In its 150th year, the Museum will also forge deeper connections with the local community, launching a free first-year membership program—an invitation to everyone to make the MFA their own. Throughout 2020, the Museum will engage community members and local artists as co-creators on various opportunities for convening and celebration, from a teen-curated exhibition of 20th-century art by artists of color from the Americas to a community mural project—initiatives that lay foundations for future ambitions.

The 150th Anniversary Celebration is sponsored by Bank of America.

Free Memberships for Community Members and Artists

The MFA will introduce a variety of membership initiatives during its anniversary year, in an effort to invite and engage a wide range of audiences to build deeper relationships with the Museum:

• Signup opportunities for free first-year memberships will be offered to visitors at 11 annual community celebrations and three seasonal MFA Late Nites taking place in 2020. These memberships will allow access to the Museum for a full year.
• The MFA will inaugurate an ongoing program of lifetime admission benefits for all living artists represented in its collection, as well as gift one-year memberships to artists who partner with the Museum on exhibitions, programs and events during the anniversary year.
• Additional benefits will be offered throughout the year to existing members in appreciation of their ongoing support—such as allowing them to bring more friends and family to the MFA—further empowering these longtime supporters as ambassadors for the Museum in their own communities.

For nearly two decades, the MFA’s annual community celebrations—expanded in the fall of 2019 to include Latinx Heritage Night and Indigenous Peoples’ Day—have featured activities and performances that represent the art, history and global influences throughout Greater Boston. All of the community celebrations, as well as the MFA Late Nites—seasonal after-hours celebrations introduced in the fall of 2017—are co-created with valued community partners, artists and performers, highlighting external perspectives and local expertise. The free first-year membership initiative will invite all attendees of these popular events to return to the MFA often and with others, with the goal of fostering a sense of belonging at the Museum year-round.

The full schedule of signup opportunities in 2020 includes:

• Martin Luther King Jr. Day, January 20, 2020
• Lunar New Year Celebration, February 1, 2020
• Nowruz, March 21, 2020
• MFA Late Nites, April 3, 2020
• Memorial Day, May 25, 2020
• Juneteenth, June 17, 2020
• MFA Late Nites, June 2020
• Highland Street Foundation Free Fun Friday, Summer 2020
• ASL Night, September 2020
• Latinx Heritage Night, September 2020
• Indigenous Peoples’ Day, October 12, 2020
• MFA Late Nites, October 2020
• Diwali, November 2020
• Hanukkah, December 2020

More Celebrations

There will be other occasions to celebrate the MFA’s 150th anniversary in 2020:

• The Museum will mark the actual anniversary day of the signing of the Act of Incorporation that founded the MFA in 1870 on February 4. Details will be announced in early 2020.
• A summertime block party will enliven the MFA’s outdoor spaces with performances by local artists, art-making activities, food and beverages. The family-friendly event will also provide an opportunity to enjoy a new interactive play space, located on the Museum’s campus and designed to encourage curiosity among visitors of all ages. The MFA will commission an artist to partner on the design; more information will be unveiled by the spring.
• In late 2020, the Museum will host a fundraiser with proceeds designated to support future diversity and inclusion efforts at the MFA.

Exhibitions and Gallery Reinstallations

The Museum’s exhibition program during its 150th year will focus on honoring a diverse range of artists and perspectives and highlighting untold narratives, as well as engaging the expertise and viewpoints of the Boston community:

• Women Take the Floor will be on view in the MFA’s Art of the Americas Wing throughout 2020 and offer a revolutionary seven-gallery “takeover” of approximately 200 artworks by more than 100 women, advocating for diversity, inclusion and gender equity in museums, the art world and beyond. Marking the centennial of the women’s suffrage amendment in the U.S., the exhibition will celebrate well-known female pioneers and innovators while also emphasizing the work and stories of overlooked and underrepresented artists. Women Take the Floor will feature paintings, sculpture, jewelry, ceramics and furniture, as well as several rotations of textiles, prints and photographs throughout the 18-month run. To ensure that the exhibition represented a broad range of perspectives, the MFA convened a roundtable discussion with local women community leaders to provide feedback on the project. As a result, outside voices are a key feature of the exhibition’s central gallery, dedicated to portraits of women created by women. Porsha Olayiwola, the current poet laureate for the city of Boston, will write a new poem and perform it on video, and the local feminist collective The Cauldron has identified quotes from feminist voices, which will be featured in the entry space.
• Opening in 2019 and continuing into early 2020, Ancient Nubia Now will re-examine the series of powerful kingdoms that flourished in the present-day Sudanese Nile Valley for almost 3,000 years between 2400 B.C.E. and 300 C.E. The exhibition will explore how existing narratives about Nubia have changed over time—influenced by new discoveries, ways of thinking and broadened perspectives—and how they resonate with contemporary audiences.
• On Martin Luther King Jr. Day (January 20), the MFA will open an exhibition of 20th-century art by artists of color from the Americas, curated by paid teen fellows from local organizations Becoming a Man (BAM) and The BASE, the Museum’s Teen Arts Council (TAC) and STEAM Team, and participants from the Bloomberg Arts Internship Boston program managed by EdVestors. The exhibition will be the culmination of the teen scholars’ mentorship under Layla Bermeo, the MFA’s Kristin and Roger Servison Associate Curator of Paintings, Art of the Americas, involving workshops for building curatorial skills such as research, label writing and gallery design.
• In April, the Museum will open an exhibition celebrating the post-graffiti movement of 1980s New York City through the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat and his peers, which will be accompanied by a community mural project led by local artists Rob “Problak” Gibbs and Rob Stull.
• The opening of four reinstalled galleries for Dutch and Flemish art in the fall of 2020 will celebrate the launch of the Center of Netherlandish Art (CNA), an innovative center for scholarship housed at the MFA and the first resource of its kind in the U.S. The new thematic and interdisciplinary displays will feature masterworks by artists such as Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn, Peter Paul Rubens and Gerrit Dou alongside silver, Delft ceramics and other objects that represent the visual culture of the Netherlands in the 17th century.

More information about 2020 exhibitions will be forthcoming.

Conservation Center

In the summer of 2020, the MFA will open a state-of-the-art Conservation Center, strengthening the Museum’s commitment to the care and preservation of its collection at the highest level. The new 22,000-square-foot space will comprise six laboratories and feature advanced technology, completing a transformational 18-month renovation process that was supported by the largest fundraising effort for conservation in the Museum’s history. The Conservation Center’s open floor plan will foster a more interdisciplinary and collaborative approach among the MFA’s staff of more than 50 conservators, as well as increase their capacity to provide training for colleagues in the field and future museum professionals. A dedicated learning space for public programs and educational initiatives will invite visitors of all ages to engage with conservators and connect with art and science in new and dynamic ways.

New Perspectives on the Past and Looking to the Future

Throughout 2020, the MFA will highlight key moments from its history, engaging audiences on-site and on social media with untold or little-known stories centered on works of art from the collection. A self-guided tour of 15 objects—one from each decade since the Museum’s founding—will be available for visitors throughout the year. The tour will share the history of how staff and donors have worked together to build a global collection drawn from across cultures and time, fulfilling the vision of the MFA’s first president Martin Brimmer for the Museum to open its doors to art from all over the world. This fresh look at the MFA’s collection will provide new perspectives—for example, the key role that women such as Harriet White Bradbury and Saundra Lane have played in gifting important works of art and providing financial support for the Museum since its founding. The theme of “Women within Our History,” from artists to donors to collectors, will also be further explored and celebrated during Art in Bloom, the MFA’s annual festival of fine art and flowers, in April 2020.

Looking toward the future, the MFA will introduce a range of initiatives during its anniversary year that will make a lasting impact beyond 2020. In an effort to increase the diversity of perspectives represented in exhibitions and gallery displays, the Museum will launch the “Table of Voices,” a new program designed to involve community voices in the MFA’s interpretation program on a deeper level. The program will formalize interpretive strategies used for recent exhibitions and gallery re-installations such as Gender Bending Fashion and the Arts of Islamic Cultures Gallery, which engaged community members and partner organizations in the decision-making processes. The “Table of Voices” will also feature a paid fellowship component that will create a pipeline for new talent to enter the rapidly expanding field of museum interpretation.

Over the past several years, the Museum has implemented a variety of systems to reduce its carbon footprint. In 2020, the MFA will further its evolution into a “green” museum, introducing new environmental initiatives aligned with the recommendations of Boston’s Green Ribbon Commission, a group of business, institutional and civic leaders throughout the city working to develop strategies for fighting climate change. These initiatives will demonstrate the MFA’s commitment to future generations and engagement with issues affecting today’s world.

One of the nation’s oldest art museums, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), was founded on February 4, 1870. The Museum opened its doors to the public on July 4, 1876—the nation’s centennial—at its original location in Copley Square. Over the next several decades, the MFA’s collection and visitation grew exponentially, and in 1909, the Museum moved to its current home on Huntington Avenue. Today, the MFA houses a global collection encompassing nearly 500,000 works of art, from ancient to contemporary, and welcomes approximately 1.2 million visitors each year to celebrate the human experience through art as well as innovative exhibitions and programs. In 2017, Matthew Teitelbaum, the 11th director in the Museum’s history, unveiled MFA 2020, a three-year Strategic Plan that articulated a forward-looking vision for the Museum to become an institution of the moment and more connected to the community. The spirit of collaboration and engagement at the core of MFA 2020 has been brought to life over the past three years through the implementation of more than 50 initiatives, the full slate of which will be realized during the Museum’s 150th anniversary year.

Open seven days a week, the MFA’s hours are Saturday through Tuesday, 10 am–5 pm; and Wednesday through Friday, 10 am–10 pm. Admission is free for MFA Members, University Members and youths age 17 and younger. Wednesday nights after 4 pm admission is by voluntary contribution (suggested donation $25) and is free to all visitors during Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the Lunar New Year Celebration, Memorial Day, Free Fun Friday and Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Admission (which includes one repeat visit within 10 days) is $25 for adults and $23 for seniors and students age 18 and older, and includes entry to all galleries and special exhibitions. The Museum’s mobile MFA Guide is available at ticket desks and the Sharf Visitor Center for $5, members; $6, non-members; and $4, youths. The Museum is closed on New Year’s Day, Patriots’ Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. The MFA is located on the Avenue of the Arts at 465 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115. For more information, call 617.267.9300, visit mfa.org or follow the MFA on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Kering, through its Women In Motion program, is partnering with the creative arts publisher Phaidon and its sister company Artspace, a leading online marketplace, to launch the new book Great Women Artists. (Link to Great Women Artists on Artspace.com: www.artspace.com/greatwomenartists)

Kering, a partner of the Festival de Cannes, launched Women In Motion in 2015 to shine a light on women’s contribution to cinema, both in front of and behind the camera. Since then, the program has been expanded to include the worlds of photography, arts and literature. For although creativity is one of the most powerful forces for change, gender inequality in this areas remains flagrant. Through its awards, The program recognizes both inspirational figures and talented young women, while its Talks provide an opportunity for some of the leading names in cinema and arts to share their views on women’s representation in their profession. For the past five years, Women In Motion has been a platform for helping to change mindsets and to providing thought leadership on both the role and the recognition given to women in all areas of the arts.

Phaidon will publish Great Women Artists an extensive illustrated book on women artists that reflects an era where art made by women is more prominent than ever. The book tells the stories of over 400 artists spanning 500 years and reveals a parallel yet equally engaging history of art for an age that champions a great diversity of voices.

According to information published on the Phaidon website, Great Women Artists is the most extensive fully illustrated book of women artists ever published. It reflects an era where art made by women is more prominent than ever, where galleries, museums and the art market are waking up to previously overlooked female artists, past and present. Great Women Artists reveals a parallel yet equally engaging history of art for an age that champions a greater diversity of voices.

Great Women Artists tells stories of over 400 artists who span 500 years. The oldest, Properzia de’ Rossi, was born in 1490 in Bologna; while the youngest, New Yorker Tschabalala Self, is still in her twenties. It’s organised from A-to-Z by surname so readers can easily find their way around, and works from different eras become juxtaposed.

It includes historic women who were hugely successful artists in their own lifetimes, but who were then excluded from written accounts in the centuries that followed, such as Angelica Kauffman, Judith Leyster and Artemisia Gentileschi. However, in some cases, those featured in Great Women Artists were far from obscure in their own era; consider Marisol, the French sculptor who is said to have been a bigger art star than Andy Warhol back in the 1960s.

Aside from the brilliant imagery, the book is filled with fascinating facts, vignettes and insights. Readers can discover more about Anni Albers, who, in 1949, became the first designer to have a solo exhibition at New York’s Museum of Modern Art; they can delight in Alma Thomas’s work; who was the first African-American woman to have a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and they can revel in the work of Diane Arbus , the first photographer to be included in the Venice Biennale.

Great Women Artists draws in part from Phaidon’s 1994 best seller, The Art Book, which was also notable for its inclusion of a number of female artists, at a time when some other popular art history books were still failing to do so. “In the quarter century since then, diversity in art history – with regard to race as well as gender – has continued to expand,” writes editor Rebecca Morrill in the book’s introduction. “History is no longer perceived as a single narrative that represents and serves only one section of society, but rather a tangle of interwoven stories that coexist rather than compete for dominance.”

This timely update might seem superfluous, in an age when many believe female figures do have equal prominence, power and representation in the art world. However, as Morrill points out, even today, “male artists are still likely to be more successful by any number of measures. They are more likely to have representation by a commercial gallery,” she writes. “They achieve higher prices in the art market. They are more likely to be written about by critics and art historians (who are themselves, more likely to be male).”

Great Women Artists won’t right these wrongs, but it will serve as a great primer for anyone keen to explore the work of lesser-known practitioners; it will please proud feminists eager to get a handle on the art world; and it will delight anyone who enjoys great painting, photography, sculpture, video and performance art.

Through this partnership with Phaidon, Kering is strengthening its commitment to women in the arts. A major priority for the Group, Kering’s support of the empowerment of women extends into the world of arts and culture through the Women In Motion program. This support also manifests through the Kering Foundation which has been combating violence against women worldwide for over 10 years.

In celebration of Great Women Artists and with the support of Kering, Phaidon and Artspace will launch a charitable portfolio of limited-edition prints to benefit one of the Kering Foundation’s partners: the non-profit Promundo-US, a leading organization in promoting gender justice, preventing violence against women by engaging boys and men as partners with women and girls.

The funds raised by Phaidon and Artspace, will support the launch of a Boyhood Campaign and Initiative co-developed by Promundo and the Kering Foundation, alongside other partners, including those focused on girls’ empowerment. The Boyhood Campaign and Initiative will shift the media and social narrative around manhood and boyhood in the US and globally, and will support parents, educators, coaches, and media makers with the resources they need to raise, teach, coach, and set an example for boys to become equitable and connected men. This will begin in the US with future expansion to other countries.

The limited portfolio of prints was commissioned exclusively for this project and features six artists and six unique prints, each in an edition of 100. Cecily Brown, Lubaina Himid, Bharti Kher, Catherine Opie, Jenny Saville, and Dana Schutz have contributed to the portfolio, which seeks to raise close to $1 million for Promundo. Prints by these contemporary artists are scarcely available, and this well-rounded portfolio offers collectors the opportunity to acquire works at an accessible price while supporting a worthy cause.

The portfolio retails for $9,000 for the suite of six, and $1,500 for an individual print. The prints will be made available for sale beginning on October 2nd exclusively on artspace.com/greatwomenartists.

In addition, Kering, Phaidon and Artspace will host a number of public and private events, including a dinner and panel discussion in New York. A special video series featuring interviews of artists Maya Lin and Pat Steir in their studios will be produced and launched in conjunction with the partnership.

Great Women Artists is now available for sale online at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Target, WalMart, and Phaidon, as well as at select brick-and-mortar stores.

A global Luxury group, Kering manages the development of a series of renowned Houses in Fashion, Leather Goods, Jewelry and Watches: Gucci, Saint Laurent, Bottega Veneta, Balenciaga, Alexander McQueen, Brioni, Boucheron, Pomellato, Dodo, Qeelin, Ulysse Nardin, Girard-Perregaux, as well as Kering Eyewear. By placing creativity at the heart of its strategy, Kering enables its Houses to set new limits in terms of their creative expression while crafting tomorrow’s Luxury in a sustainable and responsible way. We capture these beliefs in their signature: “Empowering Imagination“.

Since 2008, the Kering Foundation has sought to combat the violence that affects all cultures and all social classes. To maximize its impact, the Foundation works hand in hand with a limited number of local partners in the three main regions where the Group operates: the American continent, Western Europe and Asia.

The Foundation supports local survivor-centered organizations that provide comprehensive services to women, and, since 2018, has begun working with younger generations, particularly young men and boys, to combat violence against women through prevention programs like Promundo in the United States and Gendes in Mexico.

The Foundation also seeks to change behaviors within Kering and in society in general. It offers training sessions on domestic violence for Kering employees and created, in 2018, alongside the FACE Foundation, “One in Three Women“, the first European network of companies engaged against gender-based violence. The Foundation also organizes international awareness campaigns (White Ribbon For Women, on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women), all the while involving Kering’s 35,000 employees worldwide.

Phaidon is the premier global publisher of the creative arts with over 1,500 titles in print. They work with the world’s most influential artists, chefs, writers, and thinkers to produce innovative books on art, photography, design, architecture, fashion, food and travel, and illustrated books for children. Phaidon is headquartered in London and New York City.

Artspace.com is the leading online marketplace for contemporary art and ideas, offering both established and aspiring collectors the opportunity to discover, learn about, and purchase exceptional artworks at the click of a button. Partnering with leading artists, galleries, museums, and cultural institutions worldwide to curate the finest selection of art for sale online, they provide detailed and transparent information on every artist and work.

Promundo, whose name means “for the world,” was founded in 1997 in Brazil with the belief that gender equality is a social “good” for the world, and that overcoming gender inequalities and patriarchy and advancing gender justice is necessary for women, men, children, and individuals of all gender identities. Promundo works globally to work with men and boys – as partners with women, girls and other gender identities – to put an end to gender-based discrimination.

Presented in Partnership with Akomawt Educational Initiative and Jonathan James-Perry (Aquinnah Wampanoag Nation)

The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), is offering its first free celebration of Indigenous Peoples’ Day on Monday, October 14, presented in partnership with the Akomawt Educational Initiative and Jonathan James-Perry, Tribal Citizen of the Aquinnah Wampanoag Nation.

The community celebration re-positions Columbus Day as a holiday to honor the original inhabitants of the Americas. Part of the Fenway Alliance’s 18th annual Opening Our Doors Day, Indigenous Peoples’ Day at the MFA recognizes the heritage of Native Americans and the histories of their nations and communities, promoting the artistry of indigenous peoples in Greater Boston and New England. Throughout the day, visitors can explore the Native North American Art Gallery, enjoy music and dance, and drop in on a variety of family art-making activities. Indigenous Peoples’ Day is sponsored by Ameriprise Financial. Additional programming support is provided by The Lowell Institute.

“The MFA was founded in 1870 and stands on the historic homelands of the Massachusett people. This event is one step in building bridges and engaging indigenous communities with the Museum through local and region-wide partnerships with artists, performers, educators, tribal nation leaders and community members,” said Makeeba McCreary, Patti and Jonathan Kraft Chief of Learning and Community Engagement at the MFA. “As a museum, we acknowledge the long history of the land that we occupy today and seek ways to make these narratives more prominent and visible within our galleries.”

During the celebration, visitors are invited to share their perspectives on Cyrus Dallin’s Appeal to the Great Spirit (1909), a monumental sculpture on the MFA’s Huntington Avenue lawn, through a community-activated art project. Visitor feedback will help to inform the interpretation of the work—continuing conversations that began during a spring 2019 lecture and community discussion. In the afternoon, a welcome and blessing will be held by Matthew Teitelbaum, Ann and Graham Gund Director; Elizabeth Solomon, Member of the Massachusett Tribe at Ponkapoag; Jonathan James-Perry, Tribal Citizen of the Aquinnah Wampanoag Nation; and Chris Newell, Passamaquoddy, Akomawt Educational Initiatve.

Additional highlights of the community celebration include:

• Tours in the Native North American Art Gallery co-led by MFA curators and educators from the Akomawt Educational Initiative
• Native American hoop dance performances by Toronto-based professional hoop dancer Lisa Odjig (Ojibwe), telling the story of creation; narrated by renowned musician Chris Newell (Passamaquoddy), also the co-founder and director of education at the Akomawt Educational Initiative
• Vocal performances by Jennifer Kreisberg (Tuscarora, North Carolina)
• Hand drum and contemporary powwow song performances by the Iron River Singers, an intertribal northern style group composed of Ojibwe, Abenaki and Wampanoag singers from the South Coast of Massachusetts
• Interactive songs and dances by The Kingfisher Dance Theater, featuring members of the Southern New England Native community
• Art-making activities led by Elizabeth James-Perry (Aquinnah Wampanoag) and Kerri Helme (Mashpee Wampanoag)
• Weaving and beadwork demonstrations with artist Sparrow Plainbull (Haliwa-Saponi)

Indigenous Peoples’ Day one of 11 annual community celebrations at the MFA, co-created with valued community partners, artists and performers, highlighting external perspectives and local expertise. The series includes Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Lunar New Year, Nowruz, Memorial Day, Highland Street Foundation Free Fun Friday, Latinx Heritage Night, ASL Night, Diwali and Hanukkah.

Schedule of Indigenous Peoples’ Day Events. Museum admission is free all day, 10 am–5 pm

Share Your Thoughts

• 10 am–4 pm | Huntington Avenue Lawn
• What do you see when you look at Cyrus Dallin’s sculpture Appeal to the Great Spirit? Share your thoughts about this artwork. Your response will inform its future interpretation.

Welcome and Blessing

• 1:30 pm | Shapiro Family Courtyard
• Matthew Teitelbaum, Ann and Graham Gund Director; Jonathan James-Perry, Tribal Citizen of the Aquinnah Wampanoag Nation; and Chris Newell, Akomawt Educational Initiative

Native American Hoop Dance Featuring Lisa Odjig (Ojibwe)

• 11 am and 2 pm | Shapiro Family Courtyard
• Watch as two-time World Hoop Dance Champion Lisa Odjig tells the story of creation using music, dance and multiple flexible hoops. Narrated by renowned musician and MC Chris Newell (Passamaquoddy).

Jennifer Kreisberg (Tuscarora Nation)

• Noon and 3 pm | Remis Auditorium
• Mother, singer, composer, producer, teacher, and activist—Jennifer Kreisberg (Tuscarora, North Carolina) comes from four generations of Seven Singing Sisters through her maternal line. She is known for her fierce vocals and soaring range.

Iron River Singers

• Enjoy hand drum and contemporary powwow songs from Iron River Singers, an intertribal northern style group comprised of Ojibwe, Abenaki, and Wampanoag singers from the South Coast of Massachusetts.

The Kingfisher Dance Theater

• 11:30 am, 1 pm, and 3 pm | Gallery 250
• Enjoy interactive song and dance with members of the Southern New England Native community.

Art-making Activities

• 10 am–1 pm | Education Center in the Druker Family Pavilion, Room 159
• Elizabeth James-Perry (Aquinnah Wampanoag): Wampum

• 11am–4 pm | Gallery 168
• Sparrow Plainbull (Haliwa-Saponi): Weaving and beadwork

Examining the Collection Tours

• 10:30 am and 2:30 pm | Gallery LG33
• Join Akomawt Educational Initiative educators and MFA curators in the Native North American Art gallery as they discuss the defining characteristics of “Native art” and who gets to make these decisions. Hear about techniques used in the works on display and learn about the ever-changing cultural contexts in which we understand them.

Guided Tours

Meet at Sharf Visitor Center

Join a free guided tour to explore highlights from the Museum’s many collections.

• 10:30 am | Highlights of the Museum Collections
• 11:30 am | Art of Asia
• 12:15 pm | Art of the Americas
• 12:30 pm | 3 in 30 Minutes
• 1 pm | Introduction to the Contemporary Collection
• 1:45 pm | Art of Europe
• 2:30 pm | Art of the Ancient World
• 3:15 pm | Highlights of the Museum Collections

Education, access and community programs at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), connect visitors from Boston’s neighborhoods, New England and around the world with art. The MFA welcomes more than one million visitors annually, serving many through its learning and community engagement programs. Opportunities for free and discounted admission for students, teachers, children, EBT card holders and military personnel and veterans can be found at mfa.org/visit, including free access for college students through the MFA’s University Membership and Pozen Community College Access program. Visitors can also learn about access programming for visitors with disabilities online, which includes free entry for personal care attendants. Additionally, the MFA Citizens program offers free one-year family memberships to newly naturalized U.S. citizens living in Massachusetts. The Museum is free for all after 4 pm every Wednesday and offers 11 free community celebrations annually. Each year, the Museum welcomes approximately 55,000 students and teachers—kindergarten through high school—for school group visits. Additional educational programming includes gallery talks, lectures, artist demonstrations, studio art classes and art-making workshops for hospital patients. In 2020, the MFA is marking its 150th anniversary with a yearlong celebration of generosity, community and inclusion through a series of special events and initiatives.

The MFA is located on the Avenue of the Arts at 465 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115. For more information, call 617.267.9300, visit mfa.org or follow the MFA on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

The Whitney Museum of American Art announced today that its 2021 Biennial, the 80th edition, will be co-organized by two brilliant members of the Museum’s curatorial department, David Breslin and Adrienne Edwards. The 2021 Whitney Biennial exhibition will open in the spring of 2021 and is presented by Tiffany & Co., which has been the lead sponsor of the Biennial since the Museum’s move downtown.

Alice Pratt Brown Director Adam D. Weinberg noted: “The central aim of the Biennial is to be a barometer of contemporary American art. Each Biennial is a reflection of the cultural and social moment as it intersects with the passions, perspectives, and tastes of the curators. David and Adrienne will be a great team. They are inquisitive, curious, and are acutely attuned to the art of the current moment. No doubt they will bring fresh outlooks to this historic exhibition and reinvent it for these complex and challenging times.”

With a long history of exhibiting the most promising and influential artists and provoking debate, the Whitney Biennial is the Museum’s signature survey of the state of contemporary art in the United States. The Biennial, an invitational show of work produced in the preceding two years, was introduced by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney in 1932, and it is the longest continuous series of exhibitions in the country to survey recent developments in American art.

Initiated by founder Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney in 1932, the Whitney Biennial is the longest-running survey of American art. More than 3,600 artists have participated, including Edward Hopper, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jacob Lawrence, Alexander Calder, Louise Bourgeois, Joan Mitchell, Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg, Claes Oldenburg, Roy Lichtenstein, Agnes Martin, Cy Twombly, Andy Warhol, Ellsworth Kelly, Richard Serra, Lynda Benglis, Frank Bowling, Joan Jonas, Barbara Kruger, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Jenny Holzer, David Wojnarowicz, Glenn Ligon, Yvonne Rainer, Zoe Leonard, Kara Walker, Cindy Sherman, Nan Goldin, Mike Kelley, Lorna Simpson, Renée Green, Wade Guyton, Julie Mehretu, Cecilia Vicuña, Mark Bradford, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Ellen Gallagher, Rachel Harrison, Wu Tsang, Nick Mauss, Sarah Michelson, Laura Owens, Postcommodity, Pope.L, Jeffrey Gibson, and Tiona Nekkia McClodden.

The biennials were originally organized by medium, with painting alternating with sculpture and works on paper. Starting in 1937, the Museum shifted to yearly exhibitions called Annuals. The current format—a survey show of work in all media occurring every two years—has been in place since 1973. The 2019 Biennial (still on partial view on the Museum’s sixth floor until October 27) was organized by two Whitney curators, Jane Panetta and Rujeko Hockley. It featured seventy-five artists and collectives working in painting, sculpture, installation, film and video, photography, performance, and sound.

David Breslin was recently named the DeMartini Family Curator and Director of Curatorial Initiatives, a role he will assume this month. Since joining the Museum in 2016 as DeMartini Family Curator and Director of the Collection, Breslin has spearheaded the Museum’s collection-related activities, curating a series of major collection exhibitions and overseeing acquisitions. Working closely with his curatorial colleagues, he has organized or co-organized four timely and thematized collection displays, including Where We Are: Selections from the Whitney’s Collection, 1900–1960, An Incomplete History of Protest: Selections from the Whitney’s Collection, 1940–2017, Spilling Over: Painting Color in the 1960s, and The Whitney’s Collection: Selections from 1900 to 1965, which is currently on view on the Museum’s seventh floor. In 2018, he co-curated (with David Kiehl) the landmark retrospective David Wojnarowicz: History Keeps Me Awake at Night.

Breslin came to the Whitney from the Menil Drawing Institute, where he created an ambitious program of exhibitions and public and scholarly events and helped to shape the design of the Institute’s new facility. He also oversaw work on the catalogue raisonné of the drawings of Jasper Johns and grew the collection. Prior to the Menil, Breslin served as the associate director of the research and academic program and associate curator of contemporary projects at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, MA; he also oversaw the Clark’s residential fellowship program and taught in the Williams College Graduate Program in the History of Art. Breslin co-edited Art History and Emergency: Crises in the Visual Arts and Humanities (Yale University Press, 2016), a volume that grew from a Clark Conference he organized with art historian Darby English.

In 2018, Adrienne Edwards was named Engell Speyer Family Curator and Curator of Performance at the Whitney. Previously, she served as curator of Performa since 2010 and as Curator at Large for the Walker Art Center since 2016.

At the Whitney, Edwards curated Jason Moran, the artist’s first museum show, now on view on the Museum’s eighth floor. She originated the exhibition at the Walker in 2018; it previously traveled to the ICA Boston and the Wexner Center for the Arts. The exhibition features a series of performances, Jazz on a High Floor in the Afternoon, curated by Edwards and Moran. She organized the event commencing the construction of David Hammons’s Day’s End, featuring a commission by composer Henry Threadgill and a “water” tango on the Hudson River by the Fire Department of the City of New York’s Marine Company 9. Earlier this year, Edwards organized Moved by the Motion: Sudden Rise, a series of performances based on a text co-written by Wu Tsang, boychild, and Fred Moten, which presented a collage of words, film, movements, and sounds.

For Performa, Edwards realized new boundary-defying commissions, as well as pathfinding conferences and film programs with a wide range of over forty international artists. While at the Walker, she co-led the institution-wide Mellon Foundation Interdisciplinary Initiative, an effort to expand ways of commissioning, studying, collecting, documenting, and conserving cross-disciplinary works. Edwards’s curatorial projects have included the critically acclaimed exhibition and catalogue Blackness in Abstraction, hosted by Pace Gallery in 2016. She also organized Frieze’s Artist Award and Live program in New York in 2018. Edwards taught art history and visual studies at New York University and The New School, and she is a contributor to the National Gallery of Art’s Center for the Advanced Study in Visual Art’s forthcoming publication Black Modernisms.

Scott Rothkopf, the Whitney’s Senior Deputy Director and Nancy and Steve Crown Family Chief Curator, said, “David and Adrienne truly represent the best spirit and ideals of the Whitney. Not only are they devoted to—and beloved by—living artists, but they bring to the art of our time a deep historical and scholarly awareness. The most recent editions of the Biennial have reaffirmed its vitality and relevance, and I look forward to discovering how another pair of Whitney curators will lend their voices to our signature exhibition.”

MoMA PS1 will present a large-scale group exhibition examining the legacies of American-led military engagement in Iraq beginning with the Gulf War in 1991. Through more than 250 works, the exhibition explores the effects of these wars on artists based in Iraq and its diasporas, as well as those responding to the war from the West. Featuring the work of over 75 artists including Afifa Aleiby, Dia Azzawi, Thuraya al-Baqsami, Paul Chan, Harun Farocki, Tarek Al-Ghoussein, Guerrilla Girls, Thomas Hirschhorn, Hiwa K, Hanaa Malallah, Monira Al Qadiri, Nuha al-Radi, and Ala Younis, Theater of Operations: The Gulf Wars 1991–2011 will be on view across the entire MoMA PS1 building from November 3, 2019 through March 1, 2020.

While brief, the 1991 Gulf War marked the start of a lengthy period of military involvement with Iraq that led to more than a decade of sanctions and the 2003 Iraq War. The invasion in 2003 galvanized a broader international response, prompting anti-war protests around the globe. Though the Iraq War officially ended in 2011, artists have continued to explore these conflicts and their ongoing impacts. The works in Theater of Operations reveal how this period was defined by unsettling intersections of spectacularized violence, xenophobia, oil dependency, and new imperialisms.

In conjunction with Theater of Operations, MoMA PS1 is publishing a catalog with contributions by Zainab Bahrani, Rijin Sahakian, Nada Shabout, McKenzie Wark, and the exhibition curators, addressing art historical and political subjects relating to the exhibition.

Theater of Operations: The Gulf Wars 1991–2011 is organized by Peter Eleey, Chief Curator, and Ruba Katrib, Curator, MoMA PS1.

Major support for Theater of Operations: The Gulf Wars 1991–2011 is provided by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. Generous funding is provided by The International Council of The Museum of Modern Art. Additional support is provided by the MoMA PS1 Annual Exhibition Fund.

PS1 MoMA PS1 is devoted to today’s most experimental, thought-provoking contemporary art. Founded in 1976 as the P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, it was the first nonprofit arts center in the United States devoted solely to contemporary art and is recognized as a defining force in the alternative space movement. In 2000 The Museum of Modern Art and P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center merged, creating the largest platform for contemporary art in the country and one of the largest in the world. Functioning as a living, active meeting place for the general public, MoMA PS1 is a catalyst for ideas, discourses, and new trends in contemporary art.

Hours: MoMA PS1 is open from 12:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m., Thursday through Monday. Closed on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Day.

Admission: $10 suggested donation; $5 for students and senior citizens; free for New York City residents, MoMA members, and MoMA admission ticket holders within 14 days of visit. Free admission as a Gift to New Yorkers made possible by the AnnaMaria and Stephen Kellen Foundation.

Directions: MoMA PS1 is located at 22-25 Jackson Avenue at 46th Ave in Long Island City, Queens, across the Queensboro Bridge from midtown Manhattan. Traveling by subway, take the E, M, or 7 to Court Sq; or the G to Court Sq or 21 StVan Alst. By bus, take the Q67 to Jackson and 46th Ave or the B62 to 46th Ave.

Information: For general inquiries, call (718) 784-2084 or visit momaps1.org.

Annual Series of Italian Film Screenings Will Begin with Centennial Tribute to Federico Fellini

The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures today announced Istituto Luce – Cinecittà as a Founding Supporter with a five-year agreement in support of an annual series of Italian films and accompanying public programs. The museum will be the world’s premier institution dedicated to the art and science of movies and moviemaking. Over the course of the five-year agreement, the Academy Museum team will curate an annual series of Italian masterpiece film screenings and programs in consultation with Istituto Luce – Cinecittà. The first will be a centennial tribute to the legendary writer-director Federico Fellini (1920–1993), which will travel to major museums and film institutes in Europe, Asia, South America, and the United States.

(Four films directed by Federico Fellini won Academy Awards® for Best Foreign Language Film. He was nominated 12 times for directing and writing and, in 1992, received an Academy Honorary Award in recognition of his place as one of the screen’s master storytellers.)

Istituto Luce – Cinecittà is the state-owned company for the preservation, restoration, and promotion of Italian cinema worldwide, from a merger of Istituto Luce (founded 1924) and Cinecittà (founded 1937). Since July 2017, Istituto Luce – Cinecittà has taken back the legendary Cinecittà Studios and post-production labs, as well as Cinecittà Digital Factory, the Studios’ digital center: which is responsible for post-production to restoration. It also houses the renowned Archivio Luce, (part of the Unesco’s Memory of the World Register), one of the largest European documentary and photographic archive; it is responsible for the distribution of European films and documentaries, and the promotion of Italian cinema domestically and abroad.

The collaboration between Istituto Luce – Cinecittà and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences dates back to the 1990s. The two organizations have presented many great exhibitions and tributes together, honoring Federico Fellini, Roberto Rossellini, Dante Ferretti, and Sophia Loren to name but a few.

The partnership was announced today on the occasion of the first Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences member event in Italy, co-hosted by Istituto Luce – Cinecittà, with the support of Mastercard. At the reception and dinner to be held at Palazzo Barberni in Rome this evening, Academy CEO Dawn Hudson and Academy President David Rubin will welcome nearly 200 Academy members, filmmakers, artists, and dignitaries, and celebrate the great achievements of Italian cinema.

The Academy Museum will be the world’s premier institution dedicated to the art and science of movies. The Museum will be simultaneously immersive, experimental, educational, and entertaining. More than a museum, this dynamic film center will offer unparalleled experiences and insights into movies and moviemaking. Designed by Pritzker Prize–winning architect Renzo Piano, the Museum is restoring and revitalizing the historic Saban Building—formerly known as the May Company building (1939)—at the corner of Wilshire Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue. The Saban Building will feature six floors, including exhibition spaces, the 288-seat Ted Mann Theater, an education studio, special event spaces, conservation areas, a café, and store. The new spherical addition will connect to the Saban Building via glass bridges and will feature the state-of-the-art 1,000-seat David Geffen Theater and the rooftop Dolby Family Terrace with sweeping views of the Hollywood Hills.

“We are pleased to partner with Istituto Luce – Cinecittà to bring iconic Italian cinema to movie fans visiting the Academy Museum from around the world,” said Academy CEO Dawn Hudson. “Federico Fellini was my first love in international film—his work defines the art of cinema. And through the years, many more of Italy’s great films and directors will be featured.”

President and CEO of Istituto Luce – Cinecittà Roberto Cicutto said, “We are proud of our friendship with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which shares our deep commitment to preserving films and film heritage, and we are delighted to align ourselves with the Academy Museum. This new, Renzo Piano-designed, institution is certain to become one of the great international beacons for everyone who loves film. We look forward to launching the series in Los Angeles next year.”

Bernardo Rondeau, Head of Film Programming at the Academy Museum, said, “The Academy Museum is committed to celebrating the highest achievements in global cinema. We are excited to collaborate with Istituto Luce – Cinecittà for this five-year series of Italian cinema. We will provide an Academy experience to present each of the films in this series.

The Campaign for the Academy Museum is headed by chair Bob Iger and co-chairs Annette Bening and Tom Hanks. These industry leaders join other generous philanthropists who have named spaces, including Cheryl and Haim Saban (The Saban Building), The David Geffen Foundation (The David Geffen Theater), Dalian Wanda Group (The Wanda Gallery), Rolex (Rolex Gallery), Dolby Laboratories/Family of Ray Dolby (The Dolby Family Terrace), The Walt Disney Company (The Walt Disney Company Piazza), Marilyn and Jeffrey Katzenberg (The Marilyn and Jeffrey Katzenberg Gallery), Steven Spielberg (The Spielberg Family Gallery), Shirley Temple Black and Family (Shirley Temple Education Studio), Cecilia DeMille Presley (Founders Room), Gale Anne Hurd (Hurd Gallery), NBCUniversal, Netflix (Netflix Terrace), Participant Media, Gerry Schwartz and Heather Reisman (Gerry Schwartz and Heather Reisman Mezzanine), The Simms/Mann Family Foundation (Ted Mann Theater), Jeff Skoll, The Fran and Ray Stark Foundation, Warner Bros. Entertainment (The Warner Bros. Entertainment Gallery), Wasserman Foundation (Wasserman Bridge), and Wolfgang Puck Catering and Events LLC/Compass Group USA, Inc. The Academy Museum’s Digital Engagement Platform is sponsored by Bloomberg Philanthropies.

The Museum of Modern Art will launch the new MoMA building(s) with Artist’s Choice: Amy Sillman—The Shape of Shape, an exhibition of nearly 75 works from MoMA’s collection selected by Sillman (b. 1955), an artist who has helped redefine contemporary painting, pushing the medium into installations, prints, zines, animation, and architecture. On view from October 21, 2019, through April 20, 2020, the exhibition includes a wide array of works, many rarely seen, installed in a unique shelving display on the fifth floor of The Jerry Speyer and Katherine Farley Building.

In this exhibition, Sillman presents a highly personal exploration of shape—the ever-shifting boundaries that define what and how we see—in modern art. Works spanning vastly different time periods, places, and mediums engage the eccentric forms and unpredictable contours of bodies, fragments, gestures, and shadows. Sillman examines the creation of shape as an act of subjective choice—in contrast to art made by following systems, rules, or grids, conventions that have often dominated artistic practice throughout the 20th century. The Shape of Shape is organized by Amy Sillman with Michelle Kuo, The Marlene Hess Curator, and Jenny Harris, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Painting and Sculpture.

The Shape of Shape includes works by a diverse range of artists, including Henri Matisse (French, 1869–1954), Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (German, 1880–1938), Louise Bourgeois (American, born France, 1911–2010), Romare Bearden (American, 1911–1988), Thomas Mukarobgwa (Zimbabwean, 1924–1999), Lois Lane (American, b. 1948), and Charline von Heyl (German, b. 1960), among many others.

The Shape of Shape is the 14th installment of MoMA’s Artist’s Choice series, in which a contemporary artist organizes an installation drawn from the Museum’s collection. Recent participants in the series, which was inaugurated in 1989, include Peter Fischli (2018), David Hammons (2017), Trisha Donnelly (2012), and the architects Herzog & de Meuron (2006).

Reflecting on her curatorial process, Sillman said, “Even though shape is everywhere, we don’t talk about it much; it’s not a hot topic in art, like color or systems. So I decided to look for works in MoMA’s collection in which shape does prevail over other considerations. I found a wealth of artworks, far too many to include here, by artists who dig into life’s surfaces, who start with physical perception rather than abstract logic. Often eccentric, poetic, or intimate, these works are like bodies that speak, operating at the hub of language and matter, signs and sensations.”

The Artist’s Choice Exhibition Series is made possible through The Agnes Gund Artist’s Choice Fund endowed by Iara Lee and George Gund III, Lulie and Gordon Gund, Ann and Graham Gund, and Sarah and Geoffrey Gund. Additional support is provided by the Annual Exhibition Fund.