With museum exhibition schedules packed more densely than ever, there are a lot of shows to visit this autumn. While titans of art history, such as Ed Ruscha and Judy Chicago, will be the focus of comprehensive retrospectives in New York, there are also countless opportunities for discovery—whether it’s cutting-edge contemporary artists Yvette Mayorga and Donna Huanca, both of whom will have their first major solo shows on the East Coast, or overlooked female makers from centuries past. Ahead, exhibitions across photography, textile art, performance art, and more that everyone from art historians to gourmands and film buffs will delight in experiencing.
“Mickalene Thomas / Portrait of an Unlikely Space” at the Yale University Art Gallery
The present confronts the past in Mickalene Thomas’s latest exhibition, which marks a departure from her high-glamour paintings of Black women in electric interiors. With “Mickalene Thomas / Portrait of an Unlikely Space,” the artist has designed a new multi-gallery installation that evokes pre-Emancipation-era domestic settings. The period-appropriate furniture-filled rooms are further decorated with American portraits of Black women, men, and children dating to the 18th and 19th centuries, as well as contemporary artworks by Thomas and other artists. The wide range of media on view uniquely links the individuals seen in the historical objects and art with the present-day exhibition-goer, creating an evocative, multigenerational conversation around identity and equity. September 8 to January 7, 2024.
