These Smithsonian Galleries Are Reopening This Month With Works From Indigenous, Asian American, LGBTQ+, and Black Artists

The galleries for Modern and Contemporary Art in the American Art Museum will now have twice as much art on display and from more diverse artists.

Closed since 2021, the Smithsonian's American Art Museum’s Galleries for Modern and Contemporary Art will reopen on Sept. 22, with refreshed expanded spaces and more inclusive art.

“We have always had a terrific space to show art — our Lincoln gallery has soaring height and great natural light,” Sarah Newman, the museum’s James Dicke Curator of Contemporary Art, told Travel + Leisure. "What we didn’t have was enough space, nor did we have spaces for the art to talk to each other."

Partnering with Selldorf Architects, the galleries expanded its wall space, doubling the amount of art on display. “We also created spaces to put works of art together meaningfully,” Newman said. ”Instead of encountering art individually, we’re aiming to create conversations — between works of art, between artists and ideas, and between artists and history.”

A major part of the curation process included highlighting the changing times and the breadth of perspectives during the collection's focus on the middle of the 20th century to the present day. “Although a huge diversity of stories have obviously always existed, artists have recently been more empowered to tell those stories in their own ways,” Newman said. “Artists are giving form to their own life experiences, from their own points of view. So in showcasing a diversity of perspectives, we are following what the artists themselves are doing.”

The result is a new installation of its permanent collection “American Voices and Visions: Modern and Contemporary Art,” debuting this month. At the forefront is an effort to bring to light the artistry of those who often don’t have the platform to get their work seen or their voices heard: Asian American, Black, Indigenous, Latinx, LGBTQ+, and female artists, for example.

“The installation acknowledges the multifaceted narratives, identities, and artistic practices that exist in the United States by including the often-overlooked histories and contributions by artists, part of a museum-wide effort to provide a more expansive view of American art,” the museum said in a release obtained by T+L.

Now, of the more than 100 works on display — including photos, video, and crafts — in the third-floor gallery, 57 percent are from artists of color and 44 percent from women.

Among the highlights are “a selection of works that explore notions of national and personal identity” with art by Nick Cave, Jeffrey Gibson (Mississippi Choctaw/Cherokee), Miguel Luciano, Mickalene Thomas, Hank Willis Thomas, and Marie Watt (Seneca), as well as a new gallery dedicated to photography featuring “works that challenge representations and misconceptions of identity” by Diane Arbus, Tseng Kwong Chi, and Ken Ohara.

Of the new works, 42 were newly acquired and many of them made their gallery debuts. This includes pieces from Firelei Báez, Tiffany Chung, Audrey Flack, Martha Rosler, Alison Saar, and Kay WalkingStick (Cherokee Nation). They’ll be alongside the collection’s previously displayed art by Alexander Calder, Jenny Holzer, Morris Louis, Kerry James Marshall, Nam June Paik, Martin Puryear, Sean Scully, and Alma Thomas.

“Different works hit me differently depending on the day and my frame of mind,” Newman said of the collection. “However, I keep coming back to a pairing that I find particularly generative.” That combination is Alfred Jensen’s 1964 "Honor Pythagoras, Per I—Per VI" with Theaster Gates’s 2015 "Ground rules. Free throw." “One work is about universal ideas, the other is about a community school, but both are about the importance of form and order and structure,” she said. “Looking at the two together gives you a sense of artists talking to each other across time, and ideas traveling and changing along the way. I find it really inspiring.”

It’s that kind of powerful curation throughout the reinvented galleries that elicits a new and fresh experience, representing the throughlines and juxtapositions of contemporary art.

“When we planned this installation, we started with certain ideas in mind, but when you see art in real life it’s always different, and for me, always richer,” Newman added. “Every time I go into the galleries, I see something new.”

The new galleries are the first phase of the first major reinstallation of the collection since 2006. “This is the art of our time, and the artists are inviting us to think about the world we all live in,” Newman said. “All you need to bring is an open mind.”

The main building of the American Art Museum is open from 11:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily, and as part of the Smithsonian museums, admission is free. To learn more, visit americanart.si.edu.

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