From Now: A Collection in Context

From Now: A Collection in Context is a dynamic, shifting installation of thematic exchanges drawn entirely from the Studio Museum in Harlem's collection and installed throughout the building. Featuring a call-and-response of regular rotations of works, the exhibition is organized in sections that will unfold and evolve over the course of the year. Altogether, the installation presents a plurality of voices and explores motifs that have preoccupied artists of African descent across generations. With works from the nineteenth century appearing alongside those of the present, From Now demonstrates the myriad ways artworks from disparate times, locations, and genres—and the artists who make them—can be in dialogue. Works that have rarely, if ever, been on view are displayed with those both newly acquired and long synonymous with the institution. The exhibition thus follows in the lineage of past collection shows committed to revealing the many perspectives, identities, and forms of art making by Black artists. Although the Studio Museum was initially founded in 1968 as a non-collecting institution, our community of artists quickly recognized the need for the Museum to collect, steward, and preserve the work of Black artists. The collection now comprises thousands of objects made by over eight hundred artists working across all media, attesting to the vitality of Black culture and the significance of the Museum's mission. From Now is a tribute to these early, monumental efforts to establish and build a collection. Though only a fraction of works in our care will be on view, the exhibition is also an invitation for current and future engagement with the living history and limitless possibilities of works by artists of African descent.