Due to construction, exhibition dates are subject to change.
The Last Picture Show: Photorealist Paintings by Rod Penner
On view December 7, 2023 through November 2, 2024
The Last Picture Show presents a small selection of paintings by the realist painter Rod Penner (American, b. Canada, 1965). Based in Texas, Penner’s work captures the visual dichotomy of forgotten towns in southwest America. Painted in excruciating detail, these cinematic paintings explore the desolation and serenity of rural Texas and New Mexico.
Jennifer Steinkamp: Madame Curie
On view 2024 through 2025
Jennifer Steinkamp: Madame Curie, a multi-channel video installation, nods to the achievements and life of scientist and Nobel Prize winner Marie Curie. Eve Curie, Marie and Pierre Curie’s daughter, wrote the definitive biography on the scientist and noted her mother’s passion for gardening. Steinkamp, a pioneer in video art and animation, depicts in Madame Curie over 40 flowers and plants described in Curie’s biography. In this room-sized installation,entangled and intertwined flora appear to swirl and sway as the branches and flowers slowly move across the projection. Animations of apple blossoms, daisies, eucalyptus, passion flowers, periwinkle, and wisteria are amongst the flowers featured in Madame Curie. Originally commissioned by the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego in 2011, Madame Curie will be presented as a site-specific installation at the new Bronson Thayer Gallery at the Tampa Museum of Art.
Portrait by Yousuf Karsh (Armenian-Canadian, 1908-2002) Black-figure Attic pseudo-Panathenaic amphora, Athens, ca. 540 bce. Tampa Museum of Art, Joseph Veach Collection, Museum Purchase, 1986.024
Joseph Veach Noble: Through the Eye of a Collector
On view April 18, 2024 through February 19, 2026
In 1986, the Tampa Museum of Art acquired some 175 ancient objects from the prominent collection of Joseph Veach Noble. This acquisition became the cornerstone of the museum’s burgeoning permanent collection of antiquities that has since grown to over 800 objects. After nearly four decades, it is high time to place the Noble collection in the spotlight once more.
The superb Noble collection of Greek and Italian vases is of international renown for its breath of themes and styles, forms and techniques. The Noble vases are therefore of superior educational value to illuminate aspects of ancient Athenian myth and religion, warfare and athletics, wine culture and cosmetics, daily life and entertainment. Many vases of Noble’s collection have been on display in the past decades, but no dedicated presentation of the collection has been on display since the inaugural exhibition at the TMA in 1986. Through the Eye of a Collector will also showcase fascinating curiosities and beautiful sculpture in the TMA’s Noble Collection.
Unknown photographer, 1875. Albumen print. 8 x 10 1/4 inches. Tampa Museum of Art, Gift of Mr. William Knight Zewadski, 1999.093
Ancient Athens: Birthplace of Democracy
On view July 18, 2024 through January 12, 2025
The U.S. democratic constitution was in large part inspired by the popular government of Classical Athens, as well as the Roman Republic and the French Enlightenment. During the 2024 Presidential Elections, the Tampa Museum of Art will highlight the ancient Greek city-state Athens, as the birthplace of democracy. There, between the 6th and 4th centuries BCE, male citizens gained power in a form of government based on the rule of law.
The exhibition is based on the Museum’s extensive collection of 19th century photography, paired with a dozen antiquities from the permanent collection as well as some significant loans. Ancient Athens: Birthplace of Democracy illustrates archaeological site such as the Acropolis, the arts and culture of Classical Athens such as sculpture and ceramic vases, theater and athletics, as well as the gods and goddesses worshipped in the city. The exhibition allows the visitor to contemplate the ideals of the society that gave birth to democracy.
Painted limestone relief, Egypt, early Christian, n.d. From the Collection of Dr. Robert Steven Bianchi
The Art of Coptic Egypt
From the Collection of Dr. Robert Steven Bianchi
On view September 20, 2024 through May 2025
The word “Copt” refers to the native population of Egypt, many of whom converted to Christianity in the early centuries of the Roman period. Tradition maintains that the Holy Family sojourned in Egypt and that Saint Mark, the Evangelist, established the first Christian church in Egypt in Alexandria in the first century. The Copts shared a common material culture with their polytheistic neighbors. Imperial edicts established Christianity as the religion of the empire in the late 4th century, which allowed the Coptic community to flourish.
The Art of Coptic Egypt showcases over fifty artifacts from a local private collection dating from early centuries of the Roman Imperial to the Middle Ages, although special attention is given to objects specifically associated with the Coptic church. Today, there is still a thriving, vibrant Coptic community in Egypt and beyond, including in Tampa.