March 4, 2025

Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900 at The Met Fifth Avenue, February 28–September 28, 2025

“In ancient China, bronze vessels were emblems of ritual and power. A millennium later, in the period from 1100 to 1900, such vessels were rediscovered as embodiments of a long-lost golden age that was worthy of study and emulation. This ‘return to the past’ (fugu) was part of a widespread phenomenon across all the arts to reclaim the virtues of a classical tradition. An important aspect of this phenomenon was the revival of bronze casting as a major art form. Opening at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on February 28, 2025, Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900 aims to be the most comprehensive study of Chinese bronzes during this period. This exhibition, co-organized by The Met and the Shanghai Museum, where it will open following its display in New York, will present the new aesthetic represented by these creative adaptations of the past, while exploring their cultural and political significance throughout China’s long history.” — The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Installation views of Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100– 1900, on view February 28–September 28, 2025 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Photos by Paul Lachenauer, courtesy of The Met 

“While bronze as an art form has long held a significant role throughout China’s history, this exhibition explores an often-overlooked time period when a resurgence of craftsmanship and artistic achievements revitalized the medium,” said Max Hollein, The Met’s Marina Kellen French Director and Chief Executive Officer. “Bringing together major loans from institutions in China alongside works from The Met collection, this exhibition offers viewers an important opportunity to better understand the lasting aesthetic and cultural impact of bronze objects.”

Pengliang Lu, Brooke Russell Astor Curator of Chinese Art at The Met, said: “This exhibition attempts a long-overdue reevaluation of later Chinese bronzes by seeking to establish a reliable chronology of this art form across the last millennium of Chinese history. The exhibition will also distinguish outstanding works from lesser examples based on their artistic and cultural merits.” 

Recasting the Past: The Art of Chinese Bronzes, 1100–1900 is organized by The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Shanghai Museum. It is curated by Pengliang Lu, Brooke Russell Astor Curator of Chinese Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Title image: “Taihe” bell, note “Jiazhong”. China, Song dynasty (960–1279), ca. 1105, reinscribed ca. 1174. Bronze. H. 9 in. (22.8 cm). Courtesy of the Palace Museum, Beijing.

February 25, 2025

Louisa Gagliardi: Many Moons at MASI Lugano, February 16 – July 20, 2025 

MASI Lugano presents “Many Moons”, Switzerland’s first major museum exhibition dedicated to Louisa Gagliardi. For the occasion, the artist has created two monumental new series of paintings and a number of sculptures, exhibited in a site-specific presentation curated for LAC’s lower ground floor. The project also includes a selection of paintings from recent years.

Louisa Gagliardi (1989, Sion, Switzerland, lives and works in Zurich) is one of the most interesting figures on the Swiss contemporary art scene. Her works, whose subject matter taps into artistic movements such as surrealism, metaphysics and magical realism, forge an unsettling yet intriguing imaginary realm that draws on a wide range of aesthetic registers, from the history of art to popular culture. The imaginary worlds dreamt up by Gagliardi reflect on the complexities of modern life and, like inner snapshots of our hyper-connected era, they investigate the meaning of identity, the ongoing social transformations and the relationship between the individual and their environment.” — MASI Lugano

Louisa Gagliardi. Night Caps, 2022. Gel medium, ink on PVC. Private Collection, Basel © the artist. Photo: Stefan Altenburger Photography, Zürich
Louisa Gagliardi. Roundabout, 2023. Nail polish, gel medium, ink on PVC. Ringier Collection, Switzerland © the artist. Photo: Stefan Altenburger Photography, Zürich
Louisa Gagliardi. Swamped, 2024. Gel medium, nail polish, ink on PVC. Courtesy of the artist and Galeria Dawid Radziszewski, Warsaw / Vienna © the artist. Photo: Bartosz Zalewski
Louisa Gagliardi. Chaperons, 2023. Gel medium, ink on PVC. Ringier Collection, Switzerland © the artist. Photo: Stefan Altenburger Photography, Zürich

“The hybrid nature of Louisa Gagliardi’s works consummately evokes the space the human experience takes place in today, in which the boundaries between real and virtual, intimacy and visibility, belonging and alienation, voyeurism and exhibitionism, are blurred,” explains Francesca Benini, curator of the exhibition.

“The ambiguity between reality and representation is a central theme in Gagliardi’s art. The act of creating an alternative world through painting, which can be visually entered, is inevitably linked to the ability of digital media to extend our living space and generate a parallel reality that can be inhabited not only mentally”, underlines the curator Francesca Benini.

“Louisa Gagliardi: Many Moons” was curated by Francesca Benini.

Images courtesy MASI Lugano.

February 17, 2025

Caspar David Friedrich: The Soul of Nature at The Met Fifth Avenue, February 8 – May 11, 2025

“The Metropolitan Museum of Art presents Caspar David Friedrich: The Soul of Nature, the first comprehensive exhibition in the United States dedicated to Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840); it will be on view through May 11, 2025. Friedrich’s art presents nature as a site of personal and philosophical discovery. Marshalling the expressive power of perspective, light, color, and atmosphere, the artist created landscapes that articulate a profound connection between the natural world and the inner self, or soul. This imagery encapsulated the newly emerging ideals of Romanticism, a cultural revolution that championed conceptions of individual perception and feeling that are still vital today.” — The Met

“The most significant German Romantic painter, Caspar David Friedrich brilliantly illuminates our understanding of the natural world as a spiritual and emotional landscape,” said Max Hollein, The Met’s Marina Kellen French Director and Chief Executive Officer. “This very first major retrospective in the United States of Germany’s most beloved painter follows the celebrations of Friedrich’s work in Europe on the occasion of the artist’s 250th birthday in 2024. We are thrilled to collaborate with our German museum colleagues and many other generous lenders on this rare opportunity to reflect on Friedrich’s portrayals of nature and the human condition.”

Caspar David Friedrich (German, 1774– 1840). Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, ca. 1817. Oil on canvas, 37 3/8 × 29 1/2 in. (94.8 × 74.8 cm). Hamburger Kunsthalle, on permanent loan from the Stiftung Hamburger Kunstsammlungen, acquired 1970 (HK- 5161). Photo by Elke Walford
Caspar David Friedrich (German, 1774– 1840). Two Men Contemplating the Moon, ca. 1825–30. Oil on canvas, 13 3/4 x 17 1/4 in. (34.9 x 43.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Wrightsman Fund, 2000 (2000.51)
Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840). Moonrise over the Sea, 1822. Oil on canvas, 21 5/8 x 28 in. (55 x 71 cm). Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (W.S. 53). Photo credit: bpk Bildagentur /Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin /Jörg P. Anders / Art Resource, NY
Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840). The Watzmann, 1824–25. Oil on canvas, 53 1/8 x 66 7/8 in. (135 x 170 cm). Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin; loaned by Deka, Frankfurt am Main (F.V. 317). Photo credit: © DeA Picture Library / Art Resource, NY
Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840). Woman before the Rising or Setting Sun, ca. 1818–24. Oil on canvas, 8 5/8 x 12 in. (22 x 30.5 cm). Museum Folkwang, Essen (G 45). Photo credit: Museum Folkwang Essen -ARTOTHEK

“Friedrich’s art evokes a watershed moment in the development of human understanding of the natural world,” said Alison Hokanson, Curator, Department of European Paintings, The Met, and co-curator of the exhibition. “His landscapes mark the rise of the Romantic entwinement of nature and the self—a sensibility that intersected with the start of the industrial revolution and the growth of what we now call ecological awareness. Looking at his work, we can discern the beginnings of an experience of nature that is still with us.”

“The pictorial language that Friedrich and his fellow Romantics developed to express a connection with nature is deeply ingrained in how we see and represent the world, both in art and in popular visual culture,” says Joanna Sheers Seidenstein, Assistant Curator, Department of Drawings and Prints, The Met, and co-curator of the exhibition. “We invite audiences to explore Friedrich’s landscapes as they would have been understood in the artist’s own time and to consider their resonance today, when the environment is at the forefront of cultural and political discourse.”

Caspar David Friedrich: The Soul of Nature is co-curated by Alison Hokanson (Curator, Department of European Paintings, The Met) and Joanna Sheers Seidenstein (Assistant Curator, Department of Drawings and Prints, The Met).

Images courtesy The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

February 13, 2025

The Orchid Show: Mexican Modernism at New York Botanical Garden, February 15-April 27, 2025

“The Orchid Show: Mexican Modernism at the New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) is the 22nd edition of NYBG’s annual celebration of all things orchids carries visitors to the vibrant setting of Mexico from February 15 through April 27, 2025. Set off on a journey where the fusion of tradition and contemporary artistry takes center stage amid awe-inspiring displays of orchids and other eye-catching supporting plants. Wander through lush landscapes brought into vivid relief with thousands of flowers that showcase diverse ecosystems and rich culture. Among bright arrangements of orchids in settings inspired by the bold, multicolored designs of Mexican modernist architect Luis Barragán (1902–1988), come visit a paradise of tropical beauty—without ever leaving the Bronx.

The Orchid Show: Mexican Modernism brings Luis Barragán’s iconic architectural style to the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory at NYBG. Barragán was a leading force in defining Mexican modernist architecture, adapting international ideas and trends using the organic textures, bright colors, and native flora of Mexico. Visitors will stroll among thousands of orchids, bringing the textures and forms of Barragán’s style to life with fountain features and colorful walls and lattices.” — NYBG

Installation views of The Orchid Show: Mexican Modernism at the New York Botanical Garden (NYBG), February 15 – April 27, 2025. Images courtesy New York Botanical Garden.

February 7, 2025

Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night at Whitney Museum of American Art, February 8 – July, 2025

“Opening at the Whitney Museum of American Art on February 8, 2025, Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night is the artist’s first major museum survey. Co-organized by the Whitney Museum and Walker Art Center, the exhibition foregrounds how Christine Sun Kim (b. 1980, Orange County, California; lives and works in Berlin, Germany) utilizes sound, language, and the complexities of communication in her wide-ranging approach to artmaking. All Day All Night brings together over 90 artworks spanning 2011 to the present across three floors of the Museum and features drawings, site-specific murals, paintings, video installations, and sculptures.

Using musical notation, infographics, and language—both in her native American Sign Language (ASL) and written English—Kim has produced a perceptive, poetic, humorous, and political body of work. In her artwork, activism, and public voice, Kim confronts the systemic marginalization of the Deaf community and subordination of access while celebrating the importance of community and family. Inspired by similarly named works made at different moments in her career, the exhibition’s title, All Day All Night, points to the energy Kim brings to her artistic practice; she is relentlessly experimental, iterative, and dedicated to sharing her lived experiences with a broad spectrum of audiences.” — Whitney Museum of American Art

Installation view of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). From left to right: Prolonged Echo, 2023 (re-created 2025); Long Echo, 2022; Pointing, 2022; Pointing, 2022. Photograph by Audrey Wang
Installation view of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). Christine Sun Kim and Thomas Mader, ATTENTION, 2022. Photograph by Audrey Wang
Installation View of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). Degrees of Deaf Rage Series, 2018. Photograph by David Tufino
Installation view of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). Christine Sun Kim, The Grid of Prefixed Acousmatics, 2017. Photograph by David Tufino
Installation view of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). One Week of Lullabies for Roux, 2018. Photograph by David Tufino
Installation View of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). From left to right: Too Possessive for Score, 2015; TBD TBC TBA, 2015; Fort of Fortes, 2015; Almost a Score, 2015. Photograph by David Tufino
Installation view of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). Christine Sun Kim, Close Readings, 2015. Photograph by David Tufino
Installation view of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). From left to right: Christine Sun Kim, Ghost(ed) Notes, 2024; Christine Sun Kim, All Day All Night, 2023. Photograph by David Tufino

“The exhibition invites viewers to reconsider the importance placed on sound,” said Jennie Goldstein, Jennifer Rubio Associate Curator of the Collection at the Whitney Museum. “It encourages us to consider the diversity and richness of Deaf culture and the complexities of identity more broadly, in relation to artistic collaboration, parenthood, immigration, or diasporic experience.”

“When you sign All Day All Night, you almost make a circle in the air,” Kim said. “For me, having started at the Whitney as an educator and coming back as an artist, it’s a full circle moment.”

This exhibition is organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. The organizing curators are Jennie Goldstein, Jennifer Rubio Associate Curator of the Collection, Whitney Museum of American Art; Pavel Pyś, Curator of Visual Arts and Collections Strategy, Walker Art Center; and Tom Finkelpearl, independent curator; with Rose Pallone, Curatorial Assistant, Whitney Museum of American Art, and Brandon Eng, Curatorial Assistant, Walker Art Center.

Title image: Installation view of Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night (Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, February 8-July 6, 2025). Back to front: Prolonged Echo, 2023 (re-created 2025); Long Echo, 2022. Photograph by David Tufino.

Images courtesy Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

February 5, 2025

Picture Stories: Photographs by Arlene Gottfried at The New York Historical, January 31 – May 25, 2025

“The New York Historical is excited to announce the opening of Picture Stories: Photographs by Arlene Gottfried, an exhibition that explores the vibrant, gritty, and deeply human New York City captured by photographer Arlene Gottfried (1950–2017). Opening January 31, 2025, this exhibition features more than 30 photographs from the Museum’s recent acquisition of Gottfried’s works, offering a rare glimpse into the life and spirit of New Yorkers from the late 20th century.

“My mother used to say ‘Arlene—just don’t wander!’ Then I started wandering, but I got a camera because it gave it a little more meaning…a life of wandering is really what it all is,” Gottfried once said. With her camera in hand, she roamed every corner of the city, capturing a range of subjects from Harlem’s gospel singers to the Lower East Side’s underground scenes, the vibrant nightclubs of Midtown, and the sun-soaked crowds on Coney Island. This exhibition brings long-overdue recognition to Gottfried’s sensitive, honest, and sometimes searing portrayal of New York’s diverse population.” — The New York Historical

Arlene Gottfried (1950–2017). Ann Magnuson on Stairwell, 1984. Gelatin silver print. The New York Historical, Gift of Sally Klingenstein Martell © Estate of Arlene Gottfried
Arlene Gottfried (1950–2017). Boy with Afro on Bicycle in front of Trash Cans, 1975. Gelatin silver print. The New York Historical, Gift of Sally Klingenstein Martell © Estate of Arlene Gottfried
Arlene Gottfried (1950–2017). Eternal Light Choir Performing, 1980. Cibachrome print. The New York Historical, Gift of Sally Klingenstein Martell © Estate of Arlene Gottfried
Arlene Gottfried (1950–2017). Monique’s Daughter with Doll, circa 1990. Cibachrome print. The New York Historical, Gift of Sally Klingenstein Martell © Estate of Arlene Gottfried
Arlene Gottfried (1950-2017). Trampoline, 1984. Cibachrome print. The New York Historical, Gift of Sally Klingenstein Martell © Estate of Arlene Gottfried

“Arlene Gottfried’s photographs capture intimate slices of New York’s people and places, offering viewers a heartfelt and honest portrayal of the city that only a true New Yorker could convey,” said Dr. Louise Mirrer, president and CEO, The New York Historical. “We’re incredibly grateful to our trustee, Sally Klingenstein Martell, for helping us acquire these photographs, and to Dara Gottfried for choosing The New York Historical to continue Arlene’s legacy.”

“Arlene had an extraordinary ability to see people beyond the surface, capturing their joys, hardships, and resilience,” said Kushner. “Through her photographs, she invites us to engage with a New York that was intimate, challenging, and wonderfully diverse. This exhibition is a tribute to her unique vision and her remarkable empathy for her subjects.”

Picture Stories: Photographs by Arlene Gottfried was curated by Marilyn S. Kushner, curator of prints, photographs, and architectural drawings, The New York Historical.

Images courtesy The New York Historical.

February 4, 2025

Beatriz Cortez x rafa esparza: Earth and Cosmos at Americas Society, January 29 through May 17, 2025

“The Los Angeles-based artists Beatriz Cortez (b.1970, San Salvador) and rafa esparza (b.1982, Los Angeles) have over the years talked about ancient and contemporary ideas of the Earth, the cosmos, the underworld, and the knowledge developed by ancient Indigenous people. Beatriz Cortez x rafa esparza: Earth and Cosmos presents works selected by the artists that show how this knowledge flows around all beings and matter across the cosmos.” — Americas Society

“I see my sculptures as time-travelers. I don’t always know if they are coming here from the past or from the future, but I know that they are spaces of generosity. They honor the technologies, strategies, spirituality, and knowledge of ancient peoples and celebrate their survival in the future,” said Cortez in the exhibition’s publication.

In the same book, esparza talked about his collaboration with Cortez. “It feels empowering to be boundless in our conversations and in our creative journeys and to work in ways that are reciprocal and not unilateral,” he said.

Installation views of Beatriz Cortez x rafa esparza: Earth and Cosmos. Courtesy of Art at Americas Society. Photo: Arturo Sanchez.

“Beatriz Cortez × rafa esparza: Earth and Cosmos is not only an opportunity for the artists to reflect on their individual and collaborative work but is also a way to expand what curating means,” said Iglesias Lukin. “In turn, it will draw viewers’ attention to the fluid boundaries of authorship and the collective spirit inherent in artmaking by exposing the networks of personal relations that inform artistic creation and animate culture.”

The curatorial team at Americas Society acted as coordinators, mediators, and facilitators of these artists’ dialogues while minimizing their intellectual input “in order to allow the artists to fully tell their own story,” said Aimé Iglesias Lukin, Director and Chief Curator of Art at Americas Society.

February 2, 2025

The Book of Marvels: Imagining the Medieval World at The Morgan Library & Museum, from January 24 through May 25, 2025  

“The Morgan Library & Museum presents The Book of Marvels: Imagining the Medieval World from January 24 through May 25, 2025. At the exhibition’s center is the Book of the Marvels of the World, an illustrated guide to the globe filled with oddities, curiosities, and wonders—tales of fantasy and reality intended for the medieval armchair traveler. Bringing together two of the four surviving copies of this rare text—one from the Morgan’s collection, the other from the J. Paul Getty Museum—the exhibition examines medieval conceptions and misconceptions of a global world. 

The related works on display bring to life the world of the Book of Marvels. Together, these objects demonstrate how foreign cultures were imagined in the Middle Ages, and what the assumptions of medieval Europeans can tell us about their own implicit beliefs and biases. The exhibition also features Persian and Ottoman manuscripts that engage the theme from a non-European perspective.” — The Morgan Library & Museum

Master of the Geneva Boccaccio, Thrace and Traponee (Sri Lanka), in the Book of the Marvels of the World, France, Angers, ca. 1460-65, Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, MS 124, fols. 31v-32r.
Master of the Geneva Boccaccio, Arabia, in the Book of Marvels of the World, France, Angers, ca. 1460. Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.461, fols. 9v 10r. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1911. Photography by Janny Chiu
Master of the Geneva Boccaccio, Arabia, in the Book of Marvels of the World, France, Angers, ca. 1460. Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.461, fol. 10r (detail). Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1911. Photography by Janny Chiu
Worksop Bestiary. England, Lincoln (?), ca. 1185. Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.81, fols. 51v-52r. Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1902. Photography by Janny Chiu
Peter of Eboli (fl. 1196-1220), Baths of Pozzuoli. Southern Italy, ca. 1400. Morgan Library & Museum, MS G.74, fols. 20v-21r. Gift of the Trustees of the William S. Glazier Collection, 1984. Photography by Carmen González Fraile
The People of Chaldea, in John Mandeville, Travels. Germany, 1459. New York Public Library, Spencer MS 37, fols. 86v-87r
Pregnancy Ritual, in Natural History of the Indies. Caribbean or France (?) , ca. 1586. Morgan Library & Museum, MA 3900, fols. 106v 107r. Bequest of Clara S. Peck, 1983

“This exhibition is an opportunity to exhibit and study the Morgan’s copy of the Book of the Marvels of the World—the most complete extant copy—while also examining its perspective on the global medieval world,” said Colin B. Bailey, Katharine J. Rayner Director of the Morgan Library & Museum. “Enriched by other exemplary medieval manuscripts from the Morgan’s collection, the exhibition continues our tradition of sharing the latest medieval scholarship with the public.” 

“From legendary peoples and unusual customs to mythical creatures and other spectacular phenomena, the depictions in this exhibition show how people thought about difference in the Middle Ages. Ultimately, guides like the Book of Marvels tell us much more about the people doing the marveling than about the wondrous things themselves,” said Joshua O’Driscoll, curator of the exhibition. 

The Book of Marvels: Imagining the Medieval World is curated by Joshua O’Driscoll, Associate Curator of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts.

Title image: Master of the Geneva Boccaccio, Traponee (Sri Lanka), in the Book of the Marvels of the World. France, Angers, ca. 1460-65, Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, MS 124, fol. 32r (detail).

Images courtesy The Morgan Library & Museum.

February 1, 2025

Weegee: Society of the Spectacle at International Center of Photography (ICP), January 23 through May 5, 2025  

“Weegee: Society of the Spectacle marks the sixth major presentation of Weegee’s work at ICP and the first since it relocated to Manhattan’s Lower East Side neighborhood, the very same one that Weegee transformed into an urban stage in his photographs. The exhibition arrives at a time when his commentary on the blurred lines between reality and performance and news and entertainment feel newly relevant and urgent in the age of smartphones and viral media where every individual has become both a voyeur and a consumer of spectacle. 

Drawn largely from ICP’s Weegee collection, itself comprised of his entire studio archive and also the most comprehensive holdings of the photographer’s work in the world, Weegee: Society of the Spectacle is a re-examination of the photographer’s visual commentary on the society of his time, connecting his early career documenting New York City streets to his later work in Hollywood’s glamorized world of celebrity and working with experimental image distortions. Long regarded as two distinct periods in his career, the works in Weegee: Society of the Spectacle challenge this division by underscoring how Weegee’s exploration of spectacle persisted across different contexts—from crime scenes and fires to red carpet premieres. Weegee’s masterful depiction of the ‘society of spectators’ captures both the unfiltered, everyday urban experience and the glossy allure of fame.“ — International Center of Photography

Weegee, [St. Louis Gag Shot], ca. 1950, International Center of Photography. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (20531.1993) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images
Weegee, Simply Add Boiling Water, December 18, 1943, International Center of Photography. Purchase, with funds provided by Lois and Bruce Zenkel Purchase Fund, 1982 (150.1982) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images
Weegee, [Man arrested for cross-dressing, New York], ca.1939, International Center of Photography. Purchase, with funds provided by Lois and Bruce Zenkel Purchase Fund, 1982 (116.1982) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images
Weegee, [Lovers at the movies, New York], ca. 1943, International Center of Photography. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (2411.1993) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images
Weegee, Night… a black velvet curtain has dropped over the white sky… a few mothers went looking for their kids… found them here… dragged them home for supper… but they are back again… but that’s the same Empire State Building in the Background…., March 2, 1944, International Center of Photography. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (664.1993) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images
Weegee, [Mona Lisa distortion], ca. 1958, International Center of Photography. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (3242.1993) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images
Weegee, Weegee, ca. 1958, International Center of Photography. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (22394.1993) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images

“While he may never have imagined the centrality of images to contemporary life, Weegee’s provocative and prescient perspective on urban life forces us to reflect on how we now exist simultaneously as both consumers and the consumed,” Elisabeth Sherman, Senior Curator and Director of Exhibitions and Collections at ICP, said. “In an age where technology and constant image sharing shape our reality, Weegee’s work challenges us to reconsider the camera’s role not only as a witness but as an active participant in the creation of spectacle.” 

Clément Chéroux, Director at Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson, stated, “Weegee’s works highlight his ability to capture life’s extremes, from high society to the underworld. Often working at night, Weegee’s images of crime, fire and urban unrest reveal the harsh realities of 1930s and 1940s New York. His later shift to Hollywood did not distance him from this focus on spectacle but rather amplified his satirical approach, as he created playful distortions of celebrities that critiqued the American obsession with fame.”

Weegee: Society of the Spectacle, an exhibition presented in partnership with Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson, Paris and curated by Clément Chéroux, Director of the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson.

Title image: Weegee, Photographers at Premiere, ca. 1951, International Center of Photography. Bequest of Wilma Wilcox, 1993 (18802.1993) © International Center of Photography/Getty Images

Images courtesy International Center of Photography (ICP).

January 22, 2025

Toots Zynsky: Past / Present at Heller Gallery, January 23 – February 15, 2025

“The complexity of life and the complexity of glass are very much alike, sometimes murky, harsh and unworkable, and sometimes serenely beautiful.” — Toots Zynsky

“Heller Gallery is pleased to present Past/Present, the gallery’s second solo exhibition of work by award-winning, Providence, RI-based artist Toots Zynsky, on view from January 23 -February 15, 2025. Following Zynsky’s recent solo show at the Newport Art Museum in Newport, Rhode Island, Past/ Present will include 11 works from the artist’s archive dating as far back as the 1980’s alongside eight of her most recent works. This exhibition, Heller Gallery’s first since closing their Chelsea space in June 2024, inaugurates The Curator Lab at 529 West 20th Street.

Zynsky’s distinctive style incorporates her unique technical approach entitled Filet de Verre, wherein sculptural vessel forms are created from thousands of hair-thin extruded Italian glass cane filaments fused together and hand shaped while still hot in her kiln. Distinctly painterly, the instantly recognizable shapes and striking color patterns of Zynsky’s undulating forms speak eloquently of her profound relationship with color.” — Heller Gallery

Installation views of Toots Zynsky Past/Present at Heller Gallery, January 23 – February 15, 2025. Photos by Doug Heller. Courtesy Heller Gallery.

In 1999 Arthur C. Danto, highly respected art critic and Johnsonian Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Columbia University wrote “In an age in which the relevance of beauty to art is widely questioned, Zynsky’s work is uncompromisingly beautiful. It is, however, what the poet André Breton would have called convulsive beauty. The intensity of adjoined color, the tactile vitality of fluted walls, the swirling energies of shape and pattern are transformed into a luminous whole through the interaction between glass and light.”

This month Cara McCarty Curator Emerita, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum and former MoMA curator, called Zynsky a “Choreographer of lines and color” whose works “resemble a sculpted drawing.”

Title image: Toots Zynsky. Seagreen Lovebird II , 2023, filet-de-verre,13 1/2 x 30 1/2 x 15 1/2 in. (34.3 x 77.5 x 39.4 cm). Courtesy Heller Gallery.

January 6, 2025

Nordic Utopia? African Americans in the 20th Century at Scandinavia House, through March 8, 2025

“An exhibition exploring the undertold stories of African American artists who sought new possibilities, inspiration and environments in the Nordic countries in the 20th century opened at Scandinavia House on November 26, 2024. Nordic Utopia? African Americans in the 20th Century looks at the significance of Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden as destinations for cultural figures including Ronald Burns, Doug Crutchfi eld, Herb Gentry, Dexter Gordon, William Henry Johnson, Howard Smith and Walter Williams through a range of artifacts, artworks (music, paintings, drawings, sculpture, ceramics, textiles), and documentary evidence (photography, film, and journalistic writing).

During the 20th century, African Americans visited, performed, studied, and lived in the Nordic countries for a variety of reasons: a sense of adventure, love, seeking educational and occupational opportunities, freedom to explore their sexuality, freedom from Jim Crow segregation, among many other reasons. Drawing from paintings, photographs, textiles, film, music, and dance, this exhibition captures their journeys as their sense of who they were was transformed through their Nordic encounters.” — Scandinavia House

Installation views of Nordic Utopia? African Americans in the 20th Century at Scandinavia House, November 26, 2024 – March 8, 2025. Photos: EIleen Travell. Courtesy Scandinavia House.

Nordic Utopia? African Americans in the 20th Century was organized by the National Nordic Museum in Seattle by co-curators and ASF Fellows Ethelene Whitmire and Leslie Anne Anderson, where it debuted in March 2024, the exhibition will now be on view at Scandinavia House through March 8, 2025.

Title image: Walter Williams. Southern Landscape, 1977-78. Mixed media. Photo courtesy of the David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland College Park.

December 12, 2024

Solid Gold at Brooklyn Museum, November 16, 2024 – July 6, 2025

“As a material and a color, gold has symbolized beauty, honor, joy, ritual, spirituality, success, and wealth for all of human history. The alluring metal has been transformed into myriad forms—from millennia-old depictions of an idealized world to thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Italian altarpieces, from Japanese screens to haute couture fashions, one-of-a-kind jewelry, and contemporary sculptures. Marking the occasion of its 200th anniversary, sponsored by Bank of America, the Brooklyn Museum will mount the immersive exhibition Solid Gold, which is dedicated to the element that has inspired countless works of art, fashion, film, music, and design. On view from November 16, 2024, through July 6, 2025, the exhibition is curated by Matthew Yokobosky, Senior Curator of Fashion and Material Culture, with Catherine Futter, Director of Curatorial Affairs and Senior Curator of Decorative Arts, and Lisa Small, Senior Curator, European Art.” — Brooklyn Museum

“Solid Gold will transport visitors through the many worlds of gold, its joyful, though at times heartbreaking, histories, and its innumerable luminous expressions across cultures past and present,” says Yokobosky. “As a museum dedicated to bridging art and people in shared experiences, audiences will find inspiration, opening them to unexplored realms of beauty in their world.”

Installation views of Solid Gold at Brooklyn Museum, November 16, 2024- July 6, 2025. Photos: Paula Abreu Pita.

Title image: Wreath, reportedly Corinth, Greece, 3rd–2nd century B.C.E. Gold. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of George D. Pratt, 26.763. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum).

Images courtesy Brooklyn Museum.