01
March
2016
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18:00 PM
America/New_York

Upcoming Exhibitions

International Pop
February 24–May 15, 2016

This exhibition chronicles a dynamic global phenomenon that emerged in the United Kingdom and United States in the postwar era and swept rapidly through countries in Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Latin America, and Japan. Driven by a new generation of artists who broke from previous traditions during the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s, Pop Art celebrated, cannibalized, and assimilated an image culture accelerated by television, advertising, and print media. Over 120 works in the exhibition chart an expedition through the varied landscapes—artistic, social, and political—that gave rise to an intrepid spirit, revealing both the specific iterations of Pop in different regions and the energetic exchanges that propelled a widespread reimagining of art in relation to a world in transition. British forebears of Pop such as Richard Hamilton and Eduardo Paolozzi, and American Pop icons such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, and Claes Oldenburg come together with innovative artists such as Evelyne Axell (Belgium), Hélio Oiticica and Nelson Leirner (Brazil), Delia Cancela and Pablo Mesejean (Argentina), Gerhard Richter and Sigmar Polke (Germany), Yves Klein and Martial Raysse (France), Sergio Lombardo and Mario Schifano (Italy), Jana Želibská (Slovakia), and Ushio Shinohara and Keiichi Tanaami (Japan). The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue.

Organized by the Walker Art Center. This exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities. Major support for the exhibition is provided by the Henry Luce Foundation, the Prospect Creek Foundation, the Terra Foundation for American Art, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and the Margaret and Angus Wurtele Family Foundation. Additional support is generously provided by Judy Dayton, Lyn De Logi, Marge and Irv Weiser, and Audrey and Zygi Wilf. In Philadelphia, the exhibition is supported by the Estate of Phyllis T. Ballinger, the Women’s Committee of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Annenberg Foundation Fund for Major Exhibitions, The Laura and William C. Buck Endowment for Exhibitions, the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation, and the Japan-United States Friendship Commission. Additional generous donors include John Alchin and Hal Marryatt, Mitchell L. and Hilarie L. Morgan, Isabel and Agustín Coppel, Jaimie and David Field, Marsha and Jeffrey Perelman, and Lyn M. Ross. Corporate support generously provided by RBC Wealth Management. The Museum gratefully recognizes exhibition media partner Time Out.

Curator
Erica Battle, The John Alchin and Hal Marryatt Associate Curator of Contemporary Art

Location
Dorrance Special Exhibition Galleries

 

Breaking Ground: Printmaking in the US, 1940-1960
March 26–July 24, 2016

This exhibition examines mid-twentieth-century printmaking in context with American craft, ceramics, textile, and sculpture that convey the breadth and vitality and craftsmanship of art in the United States from the 1940s to 1960s. Drawn from the collection, the works emphasize experimental printmaking in the 1940s and 1950s, beginning with early color prints from the Works Progress Administration (1935–1943) to prints produced at independent workshops in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Among the artists included in Breaking Ground are Anni Albers, Harry Bertoia, Mary Callery, Antonio Frasconi, Stanley William Hayter, Alice Trumbull Mason, Gabor Peterdi, and Robert Rauschenberg.

Curator
Eleanore Neumann, Suzanne Andrée Curatorial Fellow in Prints, Drawings and Photographs

Location
Berman Gallery

 

Creative Africa
May 14–September 25, 2016

This group of five exhibitions embracing art and design from the African continent ranges from centuries-old bronzes of the kingdom of Benin to contemporary fashion, photography, and architecture. At the heart of the offerings is Look Again: Contemporary Perspectives on African Art, a major exhibition drawn from the renowned collections of the Penn Museum. The works of art presented encompass a diversity of materials, techniques, and visual traditions, with an emphasis on cultures of West and Central Africa. Look Again is curated by the noted scholar and curator of African art, Dr. Kristina Van Dyke, former Director of the Pulitzer Foundation. The exhibition is coordinated at the Philadelphia Museum of Art by John Vick, Project Assistant Curator.

Related exhibitions focus on traditional textiles, Vlisco fabrics and fashions, contemporary urban street photography, and the architecture of Francis Kéré. Accompanied by a series of related programs and performances, this set of exhibitions will generate conversations between past and present, tradition and innovation, and local and global concerns through African art and design.

Three Photographers/Six Cities (April 30–September 25, 2016) presents work by photographers who document contemporary life in some of Africa’s growing urban centers: Akinbode Akinbiyi (Nigerian, born 1946), Ananias Léki Dago (Ivorian, born 1970) and Seydou Camara (Mali, born 1983).The exhibition is organized by Peter Barberie, The Brodsky Curator of Photographs.

Vlisco: African Fashion on a Global Stage (April 30–January 22, 2017) explores the company’s most enduring designs, follows the creation of a new textile, and showcases a selection of contemporary fashions by African and European makers as well as Vlisco’s in-house design team. Known for its bold and colorful patterns, Vlisco creates fabrics that marry tradition with luxury. The exhibition is organized by Dilys Blum, The Jack and Annette Y. Friedland Senior Curator of Costume and Textiles.

Threads of Tradition (April 30–January 2017) complements Look Again and Vlisco, focusing on the traditional patterns in West and Central African textiles and the techniques used to create them, including strip-weaving, resist dyeing, and embroidery. The works are drawn from the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Penn Museum. The exhibition is organized by H. Kristina Haugland, The Le Vine Associate Curator of Costume and Textiles.

The Architecture of Francis Kéré: Building for Community (May 14–September 25, 2016) is a site-specific, immersive environment designed by Francis Kéré, who is known for work that emphasizes the collaborative and collective nature of building, responding to local cultures, knowledge, materials, and technologies. The exhibition is organized by Kathryn Bloom Hiesinger, The J. Mahlon Buck, Jr. Family Senior Curator of European Decorative Arts after 1700.

From July 1 through September 5, 2016, the Perelman Building will be transformed into a hot spot for kids and their grown-ups for Art Splash. Families are invited to discover the Creative Africa exhibitions through daily gallery explorations, studio art creations, and imaginative play for visitors of all ages.

The Philadelphia Museum of Art is supported by an Advancement grant from The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage. Creative Africa is made possible by the Institute of Museum and Library Services, The Arlin and Neysa Adams Endowment Fund, The Kathleen C. and John J. F. Sherrerd Fund for Exhibitions, Osagie and Losenge Imosogie, and a generous anonymous donor. Look Again: Contemporary Perspectives on African Art was organized by the Philadelphia Museum of Art in cooperation with the Penn Museum.

Location 
Ruth and Raymond G. Perelman Building

 

Embracing the Contemporary: The Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Collection
June 28–September 5, 2016

This exhibition will showcase a recent major gift of contemporary art from the Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Collection to the Museum, alongside other works from their Collection. The Sachses began to collect art as students at the University of Pennsylvania and have been supporters of the Philadelphia Museum of Art since 1970. Their collection has been developed and shaped through their engagement with the Museum’s collections, curators, and exhibitions. Since the late 1980s, the Sachs Collection has grown to become one of the nation’s leading private collections of contemporary art, featuring major works by an array of artists from around the globe, ranging from paintings to important works of outdoor sculpture, large-scale photography, and video art. The collection now spans from the 1950s to the present, with about half of the art produced during the past fifteen years. Highlights include works by Georg Baselitz, Joseph Beuys, Katharina Fritsch, Robert Gober, Richard Hamilton, Howard Hodgkin, Sol LeWitt, Brice Marden, Gabriel Orozco, Gerhard Richter, Robert Ryman, Joel Shapiro, and Cy Twombly. Important groups of works by Jasper Johns and Ellsworth Kelly, pivotal figures in the history of twentieth-century art, will complement the two galleries that the Museum has dedicated to these artists for many years. The collection also includes a wide representation of video by such celebrated figures as Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla, Willie Doherty, Pierre Huyghe, Steve McQueen, and Bill Viola. Works will be displayed both in the Dorrance Special Exhibition Galleries and in the contemporary art galleries, highlighting the strong connection between the Sachs Collection and the holdings of the Museum. An illustrated publication will accompany the exhibition.

Support for this exhibition is provided by Ballard Spahr LLP and the Estate of Phyllis T. Ballinger. The publication is supported by Matthew Marks Gallery and The Andrew W. Mellon Fund for Scholarly Publications at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Curator
Carlos Basualdo, The Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Senior Curator of Contemporary Art

Location
Dorrance Special Exhibition GalleriesThe Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Galleries

 

Classical Splendor: Painted Furniture for a Grand Philadelphia House
September–December 2016

This exhibition will showcase a set of furniture designed by architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe and made in Philadelphia in 1808 for the home of William and Mary Wilcocks Waln, which stood at the southeast corner of Seventh and Chestnut Streets in Philadelphia. The Museum’s ten surviving pieces of furniture from the Walns’ original set will be shown in a new light, after a comprehensive five-year curatorial study and conservation treatment. The exhibition will highlight the team of makers—the designer (Latrobe), the builder (John Aitken), the painter (George Bridport), and the upholsterer (John Rea)—and the fashion for classical art that the furniture ushered into American interiors. The Walns’ drawing rooms and their furniture provided a setting imitating the art and culture of ancient Greece. The exhibition will consider Latrobe’s groundbreaking “klismos” chair design and will reveal the London-trained Bridport as a visionary who translated Latrobe’s design for the walls into classical designs for the painted furniture and whose work is represented today only by the surviving Waln furniture. Through the use of large-scale computer renderings and various other interactive elements, visitors will be able to explore the way the house’s two drawing rooms were furnished and how their settings interacted with the rest of the house and the gardens, which were also designed by Latrobe. The exhibition will be accompanied by a catalogue.

Support for this exhibition is provided by The Richard C. von Hess Foundation and Linda H. Kaufman. The publication is supported by The Andrew W. Mellon Fund for Scholarly Publications at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and The Center for American Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Curator
Alexandra Alevizatos Kirtley, The Montgomery-Garvan Curator of American Decorative Arts
Peggy Olley, Associate Conservator of Furniture and Woodwork

Location
Honickman and Berman Galleries

 

Paint the Revolution: Mexican Modernism 1910-1950 
October 25, 2016–January 6, 2017 

As the most comprehensive exhibition of Mexican modernism to be seen in the United States in more than seven decades, Paint the Revolution: Mexican Modernism 1910-1950 will take a new and long overdue look at an extraordinary moment in the history of Mexican art. It will feature a range of images, from mural sketches and fragments to large and small paintings, prints and photographs, and books and broadsheets. Some of the finest works by Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, David Alfaro Siqueiros, along with Frida Kahlo and Rufino Tamayo, will be presented, along with works that show the broader panorama of Mexican art during this period, and the historical context in which the visual arts played an important role. The exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue.

Paint the Revolution is organized by the Philadelphia Museum of Art in partnership with the Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City.This exhibition is made possible by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Robert J. Kleberg, Jr. and Helen C. Kleberg Foundation, PECO, Christie’s, and The Mexican Society of Philadelphia, with additional support from G. Theodore and Nancie Burkett. The catalogue for Paint the Revolution in English and Spanish is made possible by the Mary Street Jenkins Foundation. The English language edition is additionally supported by The Andrew W. Mellon Fund for Scholarly Publications at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Exhibition travel courtesy of American Airlines.

Curator
Matthew Affron, The Muriel and Philip Berman Curator of Modern Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art
Mark A. Castro, Project Assistant Curator, European Painting, Philadelphia Museum of Art
Dafe Cruz Porchini, Postdoctoral Researcher, Colegio de México, Mexico City
Renalto González Mello, Director of the Institute for Aesthetic Investigation, National Autonomous University of Mexico

Location
Dorrance Special Exhibition Galleries

Itinerary
Paint the Revolution will travel to the Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City, in 2017.

 

The New South Asian Galleries
Reopening fall 2016

The Museum has embarked upon a comprehensive transformation of the galleries dedicated to its outstanding collection of art from the Indian subcontinent and the Himalayan regions. The Museum will update the physical gallery space and reimagine how the masterworks tell their stories. The overarching aim is to inspire curiosity, to ignite emotion, and to deepen visitor engagement with the art and cultures of South Asia. While the galleries are closed, the Museum is presenting a number of rotating installations to showcase key aspects of the collection in other spaces around the Museum.

The exceptional collection of art from the Indian subcontinent gained prominence in 1919, with the donation of a South Indian temple hall, which made Philadelphia the only place outside Asia where a visitor could experience the sculpted figures and architecture unique to the temples of India. Dr. Stella Kramrisch (1896–1993), one of the twentieth century’s preeminent historians of India’s art, built the Museum’s South Asian collections, expanding them to include the full range of sculptures, paintings, textiles, and folk arts from across the subcontinent along with masterpieces of Buddhist art from Tibet. She donated over one thousand works of art. In recent decades, all aspects of the collection have been further enriched by important gifts and acquisitions including, notably, the bequest of Dr. Alvin O. Bellak’s extensive collection of Indian “miniature” paintings in 2004.

 

Ongoing

Drawn from Courtly India: The Conley Harris and Howard Truelove Collection 
Through March 27, 2016

This exhibition of rare and masterful drawings created in the workshops of royal Indian courts between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries features sketches, preparatory studies, and compositional drawings that vividly depict mythological themes, verdant landscapes and architectural settings, portraits of prominent rulers, and scenes from the lives of Indian nobility.

Support for this exhibition is provided by The Pew Charitable Trusts and The Robert Montgomery Scott Endowment for Exhibitions. The publication is also generously supported by Conley Harris.

 

Picture This: Contemporary Photography and India 
Through April 3, 2016 

The exhibition presents the work of four contemporary photographers whose visions of India blend keen social observation with emotional insight, beauty, and imagination: Gauri Gill, Sunil Gupta, Max Pinckers, and Pamela Singh.

 

Work on What You Love: Bruce Mau Rethinking Design
Through April 3, 2016

Work on What You Love: Bruce Mau Rethinking Design illustrates this Canadian designer’s innovative work with clients that range from countries (Guatemala and Panama) to institutions of higher learning (Arizona State University) to corporations (Coca-Cola and Emeco).

This exhibition is made possible by Lisa S. Roberts and David W. Seltzer. Additional support is provided by Collab—a group that supports the Museum’s modern and contemporary design collection and programs. Exhibition production and coordination services are provided courtesy of Freeman. The Collab Design Excellence Award Gala is generously supported by Morgan Stanley. The Collab Student Design Competition is generously supported by Poor Richard’s Charitable Trust.

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