On the Horizon: Contemporary Cuban Art from the Pérez Art Museum Miami
January 28–May 1, 2022
On the Horizon: Contemporary Cuban Art from the Pérez Art Museum Miami featured approximately seventy works by fifty Cuban artists of multiple generations, including María Magdalena Campos-Pons (currently a professor at Nashville’s Vanderbilt University), Yoan Capote, Los Carpinteros, Teresita Fernández, and Zilia Sánchez. Through paintings, photographs, sculptures, videos, and installations drawn from one of the largest public collections of Cuban art in the United States, the exhibition inspired dialogue regarding the physical, social, and political landscape of the island and its diaspora.
Organized by Pérez Art Museum Miami
Alma W. Thomas: Everything is Beautiful
February 25–June 5, 2022
Alma W. Thomas: Everything Is Beautiful provided a fresh perspective on the artist’s long, dynamic life (1891–1978) and multifaceted career that was defined by constant creativity. This major retrospective traces her journey from semirural Georgia to Washington, DC, to becoming the first Black woman to have a solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York when she was eighty in 1972. On view were an unprecedented number of Thomas’s joyful and colorful abstract paintings—the titles and forms of which expressed her interest in flora and fauna, music, space travel, and spirituality. In addition to her signature canvases drawn from public and private collections, there were lesser-known and rarely seen artworks and archival material gifted by the artist’s younger sister to The Columbus Museum in Columbus, Georgia. They included letters, photographs, costume designs, marionettes, sculptures, and furnishings formerly in Thomas’s home. The artist’s presence was also invoked through re-creations of her distinctive dresses with bold, geometric patterns and a new documentary about her life and career.
Co-organized by the Chrysler Museum of Art and The Columbus Museum, Georgia
Knights in Armor
July 1–October 10, 2022
Knights in Armor showcased stunning examples of European arms and armor from the renowned collection of the Museo Stibbert in Florence, Italy. More than one hundred rare objects—including full suits of armor, mounted equestrian figures, helmets, swords, and other weaponry—told the tale of the European knight from the Middle Ages and Renaissance through to the medieval revival of the nineteenth century. The exhibition explained the historical and functional contexts of arms and armor of this period while also highlighting the undeniable beauty and artistic appeal of these works.
Weaving Splendor: Treasures of Asian Textiles from the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
October 7, 2022–January 2, 2023
This exhibition presented rarely seen Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Persian, and Turkish textiles drawn from the renowned collection of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Made with fine materials, exemplary techniques, and stunning artistry, Asian luxury textiles have been integral to global trade for centuries. The exhibition traced the history of these works of art and the people who owned them and carried them across the world. The extraordinary stories of these textile treasures took visitors on a journey across continents, from the fifteenth century to today.
Organized by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri
Photography by John Schweikert
