Taking place April 25 in the Museum’s sweeping Beaux-Arts Court and featuring a special collaboration with artist Mickalene Thomas.
On Tuesday, April 25, 2023, the Brooklyn Museum will host its twelfth annual Brooklyn Artists Ball, presented by Dior. This year, the Artists Ball honors Carrie Mae Weems for her innumerable contributions as both a trailblazing artist and a community-focused activist. The Artists Ball is the Museum’s largest fundraiser, generating pivotal revenue in support of programming that spans special exhibitions and reimagined collection installations as well as educational programs for visitors of all ages.
“We are overjoyed to be honoring Carrie Mae Weems, an artist who has made a profound impact on our contemporary culture,” says Anne Pasternak, Shelby White and Leon Levy Director, Brooklyn Museum. “Over the years, the Museum has collaborated with Weems in numerous ways—from mounting exhibitions to supporting her important COVID-19 relief efforts—and we’re thrilled to highlight her remarkable achievements at this year’s Artists Ball.”
Throughout her artistic career of more than forty years, in works of photography, text, fabric, audio, video, installation art, and more, Weems has redefined the canon by documenting the Black experience; exploring sexism, class, and political systems; and challenging systemic violence against Black people.
The Museum is proud to have played a small role in Weems’s expansive practice by including her works in such important exhibitions as Burning Down the House: Building a Feminist Art Collection (2008) and We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85 (2017). Weems’s work will also be on view in the Museum’s soon-to-open exhibition A Movement in Every Direction: Legacies of the Great Migration, which highlights the movement of millions of Black Americans from the post-Reconstruction South to other parts of the country.
In addition, the Museum collaborated with Weems on COVID-19 relief efforts by taking part in RESIST COVID TAKE 6!, a public-art campaign the artist initiated to raise awareness among communities of color disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. The project began in her home city of Syracuse, New York, and spread to cities across the country, including Dallas, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Atlanta. Weems continues to guide and inspire the next generation by mentoring artists in her community as the first-ever artist- in-residence at Syracuse University.
This year, Dior has joined as the new lead sponsor of the Artists Ball. The fashion house has formed a strong partnership with the Museum, from the blockbuster exhibition Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams (2021) to the 2022 Artists Ball, which honored Maria Grazia Chiuri, Dior’s Creative Director of women’s haute couture, ready-to-wear, and accessories collections.
Mickalene Thomas, artist and Brooklyn Museum Trustee, is collaborating with Dior and the Museum to reimagine the Beaux-Arts Court for the 2023 event, drawing on the scenography she recently created for the backdrop of Dior’s latest haute couture show. Thomas has worked closely with Dior to select table settings and decor inspired byWeems’s series Slow Fade to Black (2010), which highlights Black women in popular culture.
