Category: Past Exhibitions

On view October 1, 2016 through February 5, 2017

From the Bank of America Collection 

Manuel Carrillo (Mexican, 1906-1989), known as “El Maestro Mexicano,” is celebrated for his intimate photographs of workers, the elderly, and families in his native Mexico. Carrillo captures the kindred relationship between children and animals, with several works depicting the playful and affectionate bonds between humans and their four-legged companions. His black and white images portray empathy and admiration, as well as the everyday beauty of rural communities in post-revolutionary Mexico. His photos, distinct in their formal composition, focus on the expressions of his subjects and their daily rituals. Surrounding architecture and landscapes, as well as dramatic contrasts in light and shadow, emphasize the narrative aspect of Carrillo’s photographic stories.  The exhibition Manuel Carrillo: Mi Querido Mexico (My Beloved Mexico) presented nearly 30 of his photographs captured over a twenty-year period, from the late 1950s through the 1970s. This body of work illustrates Carrillo’s masterful ability to capture the mood of his home country in an era of cultural transformation and an evolving national identity. 

This exhibition was provided by Bank of America through its Art in our Communities program. 

On view August 24, 2016 through July 1, 2018

In this exhibition—on view in the MacKechnie Gallery alongside The Classical World display in the Lemonopoulos Gallery—visitors will see a small sampling of the roles played by animals in ancient life, myth, and art. Whether as pets or pests, beasts of burden or symbols of status, animals are often represented naturalistically in ancient art, providing a ready connection between antiquity and the present day. But as hybrid creatures combining multiple animal and human forms (such as winged horses or centaurs), animals also populated the ancient imagination, reminding us of important differences between past and present. 

The artifacts and artworks on view span broad geographical areas across more than a millennium (from well before 500 BC to after AD 500), in media ranging from black-figure and red-figure pottery to sculpture in terracotta, stone, and precious metal. Alongside numerous Greek, Etruscan, and Roman works from the Museum’s permanent collection are a number of significant works lent by other institutions and private collections. Most striking among these loans are a Roman marble lion sarcophagus from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and an early Christian mosaic with a dog in flying gallop from the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College. 

On view February 12, 2016 through May 30, 2016

This exhibition examined one of the most universal subjects in art, the portrayal of the human figure. From the universally recognizable to the intimate and introspective, Public and Private presented more than 100 paintings, sculptures, and works on paper by many of the most important artists of the late 19th and 20th centuries, including Mary Cassatt, Edgar Degas, Alberto Giacometti, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Diego Rivera, Auguste Rodin, Paul Signac, Andy Warhol, and others. Juxtaposing their diverse approaches to a common subject reveals radical stylistic changes, as well as a broad spectrum of political, philosophical, and aesthetic meanings associated with the human form. Initially collected by Elizabeth and Alexander Kasser, the artworks of Public and Private now belong to the Kasser Mochary Art Foundation, a generous lender to museums worldwide. 

This exhibition was organized by the Tucson Museum of Art and the Kasser Mochary Art Foundation. 

Supported in part by the Frank E. Duckwall Foundation. 

On view January 24, 2016 through May 15, 2016

One of the world’s foremost living sculptors, Spanish artist Jaume Plensa (b. 1955) has created large-scale artworks related to the human figure for public places around the globe. This exhibition, the artist’s largest to date in the United States, features numerous indoor as well as outdoor installations, engaging viewers even before they enter the Museum. Interested not only in the visual arts but also in literature, psychology, biology, language, and history, Jaume Plensa creates sculptures and installations that unify individuals through connections of spirituality, the body, and collective memory. He uses a wide range of materials—including steel, cast iron, resin, light, sound, and more—to lend physical weight and volume to multiple components of the human condition and soul. 

This exhibition was organized by Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Museum of Art. 

Presented by PNC Bank 

Additional support from the Arts Council of Hillsborough County 

On view October 3, 2015 through January 24, 2016

ARS LONGA, VITA BREVIS – Art is long, life short. 

Or, more broadly interpreted, “Art is eternal, its makers mortal” 

Hippokrates of Kos, Aphorism 1 (ca. 400 BC). 

From the rediscovery of ancient sites and artworks in the Renaissance until the present day, the world of classical antiquity lives on, continually fascinating and inspiring artists. Countless students of painting and sculpture have honed their crafts by studying and emulating ancient masterworks, while others have created wholly original artworks with clear reference—whether positive or negative—to the antique. 

In this exhibition, drawn primarily from the permanent collection of the Tampa Museum of Art, visitors first encountered fascinating trompe l’oeils by Peter Saari, twentieth-century paintings made to look like ancient Roman wall and floor fragments. Maura Sheehan’s intentionally fragmented sculptures similarly challenged the viewer to consider the relationship between ancient and contemporary art. Other highlights included a range of responses to the familiar silhouettes and contours of Greek black-figure and red-figure pottery, from faithful nineteenth-century engravings to decidedly contemporary versions created by artists like James Rosenquist, Phillip Pearlstein, and Duncan McClellan. Similarly, stunning but relatively straightforward neoclassical works by C. Paul Jennewein and others stood in contrast to reimagined histories and mythologies created by Jim Dine, Nancy Graves, Stanley William Hayter, Pablo Picasso, and others. 

On view October 11, 2014 through January 11, 2015

Few places continue to enthrall us like Paris and the rich legacy of the artists who made the “City of Light” their home. Together, these artists, including the well-known leaders of French impressionism—Claude Monet, Pierre Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro and Alfred Sisley—came to define 19th-century Parisian modernity, bringing to life the cafés, city streets, and brightly lit seaside resorts of the French capital and its environs. Renoir to Chagall: Paris and the Allure of Color showcased 55 masterpieces from the renowned collection of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens. 

Organized by the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Memphis.