Visit

Calendar

<p><span data-contrast="auto">Beautiful yet lonely and melancholy—women from imperial China were often depicted in terms of their highly circumscribed lives, which were entirely dependent upon men.</span><span data-contrast="auto"> In some paintings, women engage in duties appropriate to their stations in life, according to patriarchal Confucian principles. Other paintings show women with fanciful coiffures and silk dresses, </span><span data-contrast="auto">serving as musicians or courtesans, existing to please men.</span><span data-contrast="auto"> Literary and visual artists often compared women to flowers: refined and delicate yet fragile, their beauty (meaning marriageability) transient. </span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233279&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559738&quot;:225,&quot;335559739&quot;:225,&quot;335559740&quot;:480}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">But some artists hinted at</span> <span data-contrast="auto">suppressed urges and unacknowledged emotions, reflecting a growing interest in the inner lives of their subjects. In their paintings we see the equivalent of the following verses, sung by the female protagonist in the play </span><i><span data-contrast="auto">The Peony Pavilion</span></i><span data-contrast="auto"> (1598). Confined </span><span data-contrast="auto">to the </span><span data-contrast="auto">inner quarters of her home</span><span data-contrast="auto">, she laments a </span><span data-contrast="auto">brilliantly flowering</span><span data-contrast="auto"> spring scene in her isolated garden:</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233279&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559731&quot;:720,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:480}"> </span></p>
<hr/>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span data-contrast="auto">The flowers in purple and red,</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233279&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559685&quot;:720,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:480}"> </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span data-contrast="auto">Scattering here and there,</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233279&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559685&quot;:720,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:480}"> </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span data-contrast="auto">Yet only accompanied by</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233279&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559685&quot;:720,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:480}"> </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span data-contrast="auto">Dry wells and ruined fence.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233279&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559685&quot;:720,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:480}"> </span></p>
<p>&nbsp;<br />
&nbsp;<br />
<a href="https://collections.artsmia.org/exhibitions/2811/captive-beauties-depictions-of-women-in-late-imperial-china" class="button">Explore the art in this exhibition from home.</a></p>


Captive Beauties: Depictions of Women in Late Imperial China

<p><span style="font-size:large">Leslie Barlow’s MAEP exhibition “Within, Between, and Beyond” explores representation, race, family, and belonging. Comprised of both paintings and video interviews, the work shares stories of 16 Minnesotans who use the terms mixed race, multiracial, and/or transnational/transracial adoptee to identify themselves and their lived experiences. “Within, Between, and Beyond” invites us to hold space for, recognize, and reconsider our presumptions about race in Minnesota.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:large">Barlow lives and works in Minneapolis. Her life-sized oil paintings serve as both monuments to community members and explorations into how race entangles the intimate sphere of love, family, and friendship. Her work is tender, nuanced, and inspired by community dialogue and personal experience. Barlow is a recipient of the 2021 Jerome Hill Fellowship, 2019 McKnight Visual Artist Fellowship, the 20/20 Springboard Fellowship, and the MN State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grant in 2016 and 2018. In 2018, she received the Minnesota Museum of American Art Purchase Award in the Minnesota State Fair Juried Exhibition. Barlow earned her BFA in 2011 from the University of Wisconsin-Stout and her MFA in 2016 from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. Interviews were conducted and created in partnership with Lola Osunkoya, MA LPCC, and Ryan Stopera of Free Truth Media.</span></p>
<div style="margin-top:50px" class="border-top-3">
<h2>Selected Video Interviews</h2>
<div style="margin-top:30px">
<h3 class="Mia-bold">Atquetzali</h3>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/574184017?color=ffffff&#038;byline=0" width="840" height="500" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</div>
<hr/>
<div style="margin-top:30px">
<h3 class="Mia-bold">Duaba</h3>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/574181445?color=ffffff&#038;byline=0" width="840" height="500" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</div>
<div style="margin-top:30px">
<p><span style="font-size:large">More information about the exhibition, resources, and MidWest Mixed can be found <a href="https://www.midwestmixed.com/resources">here</a>. </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:large">More information can be found about the MidWest Mixed Annual Conference <a href="https://mwm.swoogo.com/mwmbeyondthebounds/1188516">here</a>. </span>
</div>
<div style="margin-top:30px">
This exhibition is part of the <a rel="noopener" href="http://new.artsmia.org/exhibitions/maep/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Minnesota Artists Exhibition Program</a>, now located in the U.S. Bank Gallery.
</div>
<div style="margin-top:30px">
Generous support for MAEP provided by:<br />
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone wp-image-69432 " src="https://live-artsmia.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/McKnight_logo_whtonblk_rgb-1.png" alt="" width="300" height="54" srcset="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/01101456/McKnight_logo_whtonblk_rgb-1.png 800w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/01101456/McKnight_logo_whtonblk_rgb-1-768x138.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /></p>
<p>Additional support provided by RBC Wealth Management.
</p></div>
</div>


Leslie Barlow: Within, Between, and Beyond

<div style="margin-top: 20px">
<div style="margin-top: 35px"><a href="https://new.artsmia.org/art-artists/explore/in-the-presence-of-our-ancestors-southern-perspectives-in-african-american-art/"><button class="background-black">Enter the Exhibition</button></a></div>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">“We as a people of Africa have a story to tell about a journey of four hundred years here in America.” &#8211; Joe Minter</span><span style="font-weight: 400">“</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">In the Presence of Our Ancestors: Southern Perspectives in African American Art” brings together methods of visual storytelling and ancestral memory through the individual practices of artists from the “Black Belt” region of the American South—a term that refers to the region’s black soil, as well as the legacies of African Americans who shaped its social and agrarian culture. Spanning from Louisiana to Florida, and the mid-20th century to the present, the artists highlighted in this exhibition document rural life and traditions of metalwork, funerary and yard art, and quilt making. Here, we witness an evolution of regional artistic practice, as raw materials and found objects related to time, place, and accessibility take center stage.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">These artworks are sometimes called &#8220;folk&#8221; or &#8220;vernacular,&#8221; and the artists who made them labeled &#8220;self-taught.&#8221; Within the context of art museums, institutions rooted in colonial endeavors and oppression, such terms diminish the thoughtfulness and creative autonomy of both artwork and artist; for this reason, we do not use them here. The works speak for themselves, centering Black voices, material traditions, and visions.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">We invite you to embark on a spiritual journey, experiencing the artworks and lives they connect us with from home.  </span></p>
</div>
<div style="margin-top: 35px"><a href="https://new.artsmia.org/art-artists/explore/in-the-presence-of-our-ancestors-southern-perspectives-in-african-american-art/"><button class="background-black">Enter the Exhibition</button></a></div>
<div style="margin-top: 35px"><a href="https://live-artsmia.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/In-the-Presence-of-Our-Ancestors-Teachers-Guide.pdf"><button class="background-black">Download the Teachers Guide</button></a></div>
<div class="border-top-3" style="margin-top: 30px">
<h3>About the Souls Grown Deep Foundation</h3>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">Founded in 2010 by the late collector and art historian William Arnett (1939–2020), the Souls Grown Deep Foundation is dedicated to documenting, preserving, and promoting the contributions of African American artists of the South and the cultural traditions in which they are rooted. Mia acquired 33 works in 2017 as part of the foundation’s initiative to introduce the collection to major museums across the nation. The foundation also collaborates with institutions each year to expand avenues of scholarship and professional development for college students of color. It prioritizes creative communal sustainability through grantmaking, artist’s rights, and more recently, Covid-19 relief and voting rights.</span></p>
</div>
<p><i><span style="font-weight: 400">In honor of the Souls Grown Deep Foundation’s commitment to community, we recognize the contributions made by many to produce this exhibition. It is curated by inaugural Souls Grown Deep Foundation intern, Starasea Nidiala Camara, in collaboration with Mia’s BIPOC Curatorial Advisory Committee—Keisha Williams, Bayou Bay, Anniessa Antar, Tamira Amin, Frederica Simmons, Victoria Myers, Minna Jain, and Jeanine Pollard—with interpretation by visiting local artists through the Transcontinental Dialogue Project. A special thank-you goes to the 2019–2020 Souls Grown Deep Foundation intern cohort, and to the artists and their families who were such gracious hosts.</span></i></p>
<div class="border-top-3" style="margin-top: 30px">
<p>Major Sponsor:<br />
<img loading="lazy" class="alignleft wp-image-91820 " src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/24155341/BofA_k.png" alt="" width="421" height="47" srcset="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/24155341/BofA_k.png 1520w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/24155341/BofA_k-768x86.png 768w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/24155341/BofA_k-1200x134.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 421px) 100vw, 421px" /></p>
</div>


2019.16.8

In the Presence of Our Ancestors: Southern Perspectives in African American Art

<div class="gmail_default">In East Asia, calligraphy has been hailed as the highest of all art forms for more than 15 centuries. It’s not hard to understand why: With more than 80,000 Chinese characters and infinite graphic variations, the expressive potential is unlimited. The results, as seen in this exhibition, speak for themselves. Each work is a unique expression of the artist’s personality, offering a glimpse into the culture that held calligraphy in such high esteem.</div>
<div style="margin-top: 30px;">
<div class="gmail_default" style="margin-bottom: 30px;">The Japanese writing system was adopted from Chinese characters; given the Japanese reverence for Chinese artistic traditions, these works explore the full range of scripts possible with these characters: seal script (<em>tensho</em>), running script (<em>gyosho</em>), cursive script (<em>sosho</em>), clerical script (<em>reisho</em>), and standard script (<em>kaisho</em>). Calligraphy’s emphasis on movement and timing suggests dancing, and each script has its own rhythm, from the formal strictness of seal script to the wild dance of cursive writing.</div>
<div style="margin-top: 30px;">
<span class="Mia-bold">This exhibition will be presented in two rotations: </span></p>
<ul>
<li>Rotation 1: August 1, 2020 &#8211; June 6, 2021.</li>
<li> Rotation 2: June 19, 2021 &#8211; January 2, 2022.</li>
</div>
</ul>
</div>
<div style="margin-top: 40px;"><a class="link-fade-in-brdr" href="https://lume.space/mia/group/20-dances-japanese-calligraphy-then-and-now"><button class="background-black">Explore the art in this exhibition from home.</button></a></div>
<div>
<div class="border-top-3" style="margin-top: 40px;">
&nbsp;<br />
<div id="attachment_84774" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84774" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84774 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20092611/mia_6017324_Crop-e1595273207135.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="479" /><p id="caption-attachment-84774" class="wp-caption-text">Maki Ryōkō, 1787–1833, Lu Tong&#8217;s Tea Song, 19th century (detail), hanging scroll; ink on silk, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.19</p></div>
</div>
</div>
<div>
<p><b><span data-contrast="auto">Clerical Script</span></b><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">隸書</span><span data-contrast="auto"> (</span><span data-contrast="auto">Jp</span><span data-contrast="auto">.: </span><span data-contrast="auto">reisho</span><span data-contrast="auto">; Ch.: </span><span data-contrast="auto">lishu</span><span data-contrast="auto">)</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">Clerical script was the starting point for stylized calligraphy: curved lines were straightened, radicals (graphic components that indicate the meaning of the character) were simplified and merged, the number of strokes were reduced. The script developed in China around 300 BCE and became increasingly important during the Han Dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE) as the territory expanded and an increasing number of imperial edicts needed to be copied and distributed across the country. This job fell to the official </span><span data-contrast="auto">clerics, and</span><span data-contrast="auto"> was made possible with the advent of paper and silk as substrates, rather than stone or bamboo strips.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559739&quot;:160,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
</div>
<p>&nbsp;<br />
<div id="attachment_84775" style="width: 426px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84775" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84775 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20092832/mia_6017309_Cropped-e1595273349404.jpg" alt="" width="416" height="500" /><p id="caption-attachment-84775" class="wp-caption-text">Nakai Tōjū, 1608–48, Bring the Qin, 17th century (detail), hanging scroll; ink on paper, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.24</p></div></p>
<p aria-level="3"><b><span data-contrast="auto">Seal Script</span></b><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">篆書</span><span data-contrast="auto"> (</span><span data-contrast="auto">Jp</span><span data-contrast="auto">: </span><span data-contrast="auto">tensho</span><span data-contrast="auto">; Ch: </span><span data-contrast="auto">zhuanshu</span><span data-contrast="auto">)</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">Seal script reflects the earliest form of Chinese calligraphy. It developed during the Zhou Dynasty (c. 1045–256 BCE) and was standardized around 300 to 200 BCE. Ultimately the script fell out of favor due to its linearity, which did not lend itself to the fluid strokes of the calligrapher’s brush. It did, however, continue to be used for seal carvings, which were generally made of stone and were used to apply an individual’s official signature or identifying mark to a document or other object.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">The script underwent a revival from around 1600 to 1900 CE, and was used as visual shorthand for archaism, a reference to the ancient world. It was especially favored by scholars interested in Chinese antiquity.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<div id="attachment_84776" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84776" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84776 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20093050/mia_8010159_Detail-e1595273480871.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="428" /><p id="caption-attachment-84776" class="wp-caption-text">Suda Kokuta, 1906–90, Words Concerned with Existence, 1984 (detail), ink on paper, Gift of the Clark Center for Japanese Art &amp; Culture, 2013.29.1337.1-2, © Suda Kokuta</p></div>
<p aria-level="3"><b><span data-contrast="auto">Standard Script</span></b><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">楷書</span><span data-contrast="auto"> (</span><span data-contrast="auto">Jp</span><span data-contrast="auto">: </span><span data-contrast="auto">kaisho</span><span data-contrast="auto">; Ch: </span><span data-contrast="auto">kaishu</span><span data-contrast="auto">)</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">The next step in calligraphy’s innovation was the development of a standard script. Standard or regular script is used when clarity is of the utmost importance, such as for formal documents, books, etc. It was also the script most commonly used for mass printing, which was first invented in China around 800 CE, while movable type developed around 1000 to 1100 CE.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">Though standard script’s crisp lines would seemingly require less skill, such regularity requires a steady hand and an understanding of how much ink to load onto the brush to achieve a consistent stroke—any error or irregularity would be glaringly obvious.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<div id="attachment_84777" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84777" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84777 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20093208/mia_6017316_Cropped_Detail-e1595273559782.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="347" /><p id="caption-attachment-84777" class="wp-caption-text">Ōtagaki Rengetsu, 1791–1875, Letter to Tomioka Tessai, 19th century (detail), Ink on paper, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.6</p></div>
<p aria-level="3"><b><span data-contrast="auto">Cursive Script</span></b><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">草書</span><span data-contrast="auto"> (</span><span data-contrast="auto">Jp</span><span data-contrast="auto">: </span><span data-contrast="auto">sōsho</span><span data-contrast="auto">; Ch: </span><span data-contrast="auto">caoshu</span><span data-contrast="auto">)</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">Similar to</span><span data-contrast="auto"> Western shorthand, cursive script may have appeared as early as 200 BCE out of a need for a rapid, simplified way of writing clerical script. Cursive script was used chiefly for private and informal communications as well as for poetry.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">The shapes of the characters are greatly abbreviated and sometimes altered to such an extent that they do not resemble the standard forms. Brush strokes are wave-shaped and made rapidly. The difficulty of reading this fluid script is further increased because several characters are often vertically connected without interruption.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<div id="attachment_84778" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84778" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84778 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20093330/mia_6017329_Cropped-e1595273637706.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="396" /><p id="caption-attachment-84778" class="wp-caption-text">Ema Saikō, 1787–1861, On Becoming Fifty, 1836 (detail), hanging scroll; ink on paper, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.37</p></div>
<p aria-level="3"><b><span data-contrast="auto">Running Script</span></b><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">行書</span><span data-contrast="auto"> (</span><span data-contrast="auto">Jp</span><span data-contrast="auto">: </span><span data-contrast="auto">gyōsho</span><span data-contrast="auto">; Ch: </span><span data-contrast="auto">xingshu</span><span data-contrast="auto">)</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">Running or semi-cursive script is an intermediate form between standard script and cursive script. As it is not as abbreviated as cursive script it can be read by most people who can read standard script.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p><span data-contrast="auto">Developed before 100 CE, it became the usual style of handwriting.</span><span data-ccp-props="{&quot;134233117&quot;:true,&quot;134233118&quot;:true,&quot;201341983&quot;:0,&quot;335559740&quot;:240}"> </span></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>


20 Dances: Japanese Calligraphy Then and Now

<p>Fresh and engaging displays reintroduce audiences to the interconnected, immensely diverse artistic traditions of South Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Himalayas. Collection highlights, such as a recently conserved 1,000-year-old Indian sculpture of Shiva Nataraja, commingle with new acquisitions, important loans, and extraordinary objects—some at Mia since 1917—on view for the first time. Within each gallery, multiple narratives aim to disentangle complicated histories, evoke reflection, and celebrate the artists who created, and continue to create, a bountiful variety of expressive forms.<br />
</hr>
<div style="margin-top:30px" class="border-top-3">
<h2 class="Mia-bold">Explore the Exhibition Virtually</h2>
<p><a  href="https://new.artsmia.org/with-new-light-mias-reinstalled-himalayan-south-and-southeast-asian-art-galleries/"><img loading="lazy" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/12071522/6224.jpg" alt="" width="366" height="244" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-87958" /></a><br />
<a  href="https://new.artsmia.org/with-new-light-mias-reinstalled-himalayan-south-and-southeast-asian-art-galleries/"> <button class="background-black">Explore the Full Reinstallation</button></a>
</div>
<caption>Support for the gallery reinstallation provided by the Jane and James Emison Endowment for South Asian and Indian Art.</caption>


2009.12.2a-c

With New Light: Mia’s Reinstalled Himalayan, South, and Southeast Asian Art Galleries

<p>In the male-dominated society of imperial China, most women were physically restricted to domestic spaces. The center of a woman’s life was the bedroom, where she would sit alone or with others, working or pursuing leisurely activities. The furniture and artwork featured in this exhibition, all drawn from Mia&#8217;s outstanding collection of Chinese art, would have been found in a typical imperial Chinese woman’s bedroom. These objects reflected a woman’s educated and well-read social status, while also indicating her subordinate position as a woman in a man’s world.</p>
<p><a href="https://collections.artsmia.org/exhibitions/2884/intimate-space-a-noblewoman-s-bedroom-in-late-imperial-china"><button class="background-black">Explore the artworks in this exhibition here.</button></a></p>


Intimate Space: A Noblewoman&#8217;s Bedroom in Late Imperial China

<p><span style="font-weight: 400">American basketry is as culturally and technically diverse as the country’s inhabitants. Baskets can be coiled, crocheted, or composed of interlaced elements that travel over and under one another, as in a woven cloth. They can be made using local grasses, copper wire, celluloid film, porcupine quills, or tubular bugle beads. They can take the form of utilitarian vessels or abstract shapes.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">Across traditions, techniques, and styles</span><span style="font-weight: 400">, women have forged new and sometimes interconnected paths as innovators and mentors. This installation chronicles experiments in basketry—all made by American women artists from the 1800s to the present day—that explore the boundaries between utility and whimsy, weaving and sculpture. While some of the artists sought to maintain proper relationships with materials and environments, and others prioritized strengthening bonds with ancestors and communities, all balance individual artistic expression with centuries-old traditions.  </span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">Artists include Elizabeth Hickox (Karuk), Gail Tremblay (Mi’kmaq and Onondaga), Josie Robinson (Ojibwe), Mary Giles, Elaine Small, Ferne Jacobs, Carole Hetzel, Tracy Krumm, and Henrietta Snype (Gullah Geechee).</span></p>
<div style="margin-top: 30px"><a href="https://collections.artsmia.org/exhibitions/2877/unexpected-turns-women-artists-and-the-making-of-american-basket-weaving-traditions"><button class="background-black">Explore the Exhibition</button></a></div>
<div class="border-top-3" style="margin-top: 30px">
<h2>Featured Artists:</h2>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3 class="Mia-bold">Gail Tremblay</h3>
<p><div id="attachment_94075" style="width: 450px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-94075" loading="lazy" class=" wp-image-94075" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051450/GailTremblay.jpg" alt="" width="440" height="440" srcset="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051450/GailTremblay.jpg 720w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051450/GailTremblay-128x128.jpg 128w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051450/GailTremblay-32x32.jpg 32w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051450/GailTremblay-50x50.jpg 50w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051450/GailTremblay-64x64.jpg 64w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051450/GailTremblay-96x96.jpg 96w" sizes="(max-width: 440px) 100vw, 440px" /><p id="caption-attachment-94075" class="wp-caption-text">Gail Tremblay. Photograph courtesy of Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY</p></div><span style="font-weight: 400"><br />
&nbsp;<br />
“I use non-traditional materials to explore ways I can weave traditional Onondaga and Micmac basketry forms so that my work will comment on Indigenous life in the 21st century. I began making film baskets when I taught with Marge Brown, a filmmaker at The Evergreen State CollegeI asked our students for out-takes from their films. I found film was an interesting material to weave, and I enjoyed the notion of recycling film and gaining control over a medium that had historically been used by both Hollywood and documentary filmmakers to stereotype American Indians. I relished the irony of making film take on the traditional fancy stitch patterns of our ash splint and sweet grass baskets. Soon I began to develop more complex patterns. I also began to use recycled footage from films being thrown away by libraries so I could choose certain images that suited my themes. I enjoy creating titles to contextualize these baskets and often choose materials to ironic purpose. ”</span><br />
&nbsp;</p>
<h3 class="Mia-bold">Henrietta Snype</h3>
<div id="attachment_94076" style="width: 461px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-94076" loading="lazy" class=" wp-image-94076" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051657/1-Henrietta-by-Darrell-Johnson4-1-598x800.jpg" alt="" width="451" height="604" srcset="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051657/1-Henrietta-by-Darrell-Johnson4-1-598x800.jpg 598w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051657/1-Henrietta-by-Darrell-Johnson4-1-768x1027.jpg 768w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08051657/1-Henrietta-by-Darrell-Johnson4-1.jpg 891w" sizes="(max-width: 451px) 100vw, 451px" /><p id="caption-attachment-94076" class="wp-caption-text">Henrietta Snype. Photograph by Darrell Johnson.</p></div>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">Henrietta Snype descends from a lineage of basket makers in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. This region is home to the Gullah Geechee, a group who takes pride in their centuries-old cultural links to West Africa – a connection reflected in local basketry traditions.  “When I first learned the craft at the age of 7, it was a mandatory skill. If I made a mistake, my grandmother would rip it out. It had to be perfection. I had to make the base over and over until I got it right and the next step was to learn the walls. My grandmother taught my mother, my mother taught me, I taught my daughter, and she taught hers. I’m the only basket maker left with five generations of weavers in a row in my family.”</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">Snype is dedicated to sustaining her community’s style of basket weaving for current and future generations and regularly teaches the craft to K-12 students in South Carolina public schools.</span><br />
&nbsp;</p>
<h3 class="Mia-bold">Tracy Krumm</h3>
<div id="attachment_94077" style="width: 450px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-94077" loading="lazy" class=" wp-image-94077" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08052011/Krumm-Headshot-2019-600x800.jpg" alt="" width="440" height="587" srcset="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08052011/Krumm-Headshot-2019-600x800.jpg 600w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08052011/Krumm-Headshot-2019-768x1024.jpg 768w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/08052011/Krumm-Headshot-2019.jpg 900w" sizes="(max-width: 440px) 100vw, 440px" /><p id="caption-attachment-94077" class="wp-caption-text">Tracy Krumm. Photograph by Shelly Campbell</p></div>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">In 1982, Tracy Krumm was studying political ecology at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington when a friend encouraged her to enroll in a design class taught by Gail Tremblay (whose work is also shown in this gallery). It set Krumm’s life on a new course. Years later, studying at the Vermont College of Fine Art, a chance encounter with some free copper wire outside the science labs sparked Krumm’s interest in working with metal elements. According to Krumm, “My artistic path was shaped by chance encounters, and Gail Tremblay was definitely one of my own unexpected turns.”</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400">Krumm continues: “Basketry is loaded symbolically and culturally. It is an ancient artform – some of the oldest evidence goes back 10,000 years, way before loom weaving. It was an art of necessity that allowed humans to do things and it fit with their portable lifestyle. Creating objects by hand, and making things to fill a need was nothing less than a miracle.”</span><br />
&nbsp;<br />
&nbsp;</p>
<div class="border-top-3">
<h2 class="Mia-bold">Major Sponsor:</h2>
<p><img loading="lazy" class="alignnone wp-image-93775" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/25074202/ArtfulLiving_Logo-1200x342.png" alt="" width="200" height="57" srcset="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/25074202/ArtfulLiving_Logo-1200x342.png 1200w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/25074202/ArtfulLiving_Logo-768x219.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px" />
</div>
</div>
<p>&nbsp;<br />
&nbsp;<br />
&nbsp;<br />
&nbsp;</p>


Related Events

Unexpected Turns: Women Artists and the Making of American Basket-Weaving Traditions

<p>&#8220;Rituals of Resilience<i>&#8221; </i>is<i> </i>an audio-visual experience, co-curated by the Twin Cities-based musician and community organizer Chaka Mkali (aka I Self Devine). The experience creates dialog between works by Black visual artists from the United States, Africa, and the greater African Diaspora and new music created for the exhibition by Mkali and his collaborators. Artworks by Kevin Beasley, Bisa Butler, Jordan Casteel, Deborah Roberts, Cinga Samson, Billie Zangewa, and others explore themes of identity, culture, spirituality, and power through the embodiment of Black lived experience. The accompanying <a href="https://lnk.to/ejSBGyRI">album </a>grew from in-depth research on the work of each artist, and approaches their individual visual practice as a means to access and articulate a collective Black consciousness that transcends time and space.</p>
<p>Chaka Mkali explains, “&#8217;Rituals of Resilience<em>&#8216;</em> is about the act of survival under intense pressure and heat. A place to hide when being in your body isn’t safe. A reimagining of new worlds and possibilities. The creative culture of Indigenous and diasporic ethnic groups of African descent surviving and dismantling 400 hundred years of white supremacy &#8230; through a visceral fabric of repetitious intentional movements, vibrations, gatherings, acts, symbols, and codes.”</p>
<p><em>Rituals of Resilience is co-curated by Chaka Mkali and Gabriel Ritter, Mia’s Curator and Head of Contemporary Art. The <a href="https://lnk.to/ejSBGyRI">album </a>is executive produced by Orko Eloheim, Medium Zach and I Self Devine, with features from The Lioness, SoloStar, Tish Jones, Izell Pyramid, Muja Messiah, Greg Grease, I-BE and others. </em></p>
<div style="margin-top: 30px;"><a href="https://collections.artsmia.org/exhibitions/2875/rituals-of-resilience/room/all"><button class="background-black"> Explore the Exhibition </button></a></div>
<p> <a href="https://live-artsmia.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Rituals-of-Resilience-Lyrics.pdf"><button class="background-black"> Album Lyrics </button></a><br />
<a href="https://lnk.to/ejSBGyRI"><button class="background-black">Buy The Album Here</button></a></p>
<div class="border-top-3" style="margin-top: 20px;">
<h2>Rituals of Resilience Orientation</h2>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/525149056?color=ffffff&amp;byline=0" width="840" height="500" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></p>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 60px;"></div>


2014.74

Rituals of Resilience

<p>This exhibition focuses on four remarkable and highly individual printmakers who worked in Italy around the year 1600. Each took a different path. Two were brothers, Agostino and Annibale Carracci. Promoting the study of live models and nature, they had a profound impact on artistic trends in Italy. Camillo Procaccini spent scant time on printmaking, but his few excursions into the medium resulted in visionary productions with powerfully emotional content. Andrea Andreani devoted his career to translating the works of other artists into complex woodcuts, sometimes of remarkable size.</p>
<p><a href="https://collections.artsmia.org/exhibitions/2876/italian-printmakers-circa-1600"><button class="background-black">Explore Exhibition</button></a></p>


Italian Printmakers Circa 1600: Four Diverging Paths

<p>In 1964, a young David Hockney won First Prize at the International Exhibition of Drawings and Engravings in Lugano, Switzerland; at the same event, Amano Kazumi received an excellence award for prints of his abstract Moral series. Amano first studied under Munakata Shikō, Japan’s best-known contemporary print artist, who is famous for his roughly executed black-and-white designs. Amano’s early works emulate Munakata’s style but take on subjects of his home, Toyama, such as dances associated with the iron mills. In the early 1960s, Amano radically changed his style and from then on created abstract shapes in strong and bright colors. In 1971, Amano left Japan and moved with his family to New York. This exhibition focuses on Amano’s time in Japan and presents prints from the extensive collection of Sue Y. S. Kimm and Seymour Grufferman.</p>
<div style="margin-top:30px">
<a href="https://collections.artsmia.org/exhibitions/2904/amano-kazumi/room/all"><button class="background-black">Explore Exhibition</button></a>
</div>


Amano Kazumi: Prints from the Kimm-Grufferman Collection

<p>This exhibition introduces Mia’s groundbreaking acquisition of the Fly Zine Archive, a thematically focused collection of nearly 2,000 zines, comics, and underground publications by a diverse range of punk, anarchist, feminist, and LGBTQ+ artists and writers active in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere. Compiled by the New York–based artist and activist Fly NYC, the archive chronicles the graphic art and printed ephemera connecting the alternative subcultures that flourished in urban centers in the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s. The display will feature a selection of punk fanzines, anarchist pamphlets, squatting ephemera, mini-comics distributed at protests, illustrated political booklets, and other counterculture publications. </p>
<p>The Fly Zine Archive exhibition was organized by Ian Karp, John E. Andrus III Curatorial Fellow in Mia’s Department of Prints and Drawings.</p>


Fly Zine Archive: A Chronicle of Punk, Queer, and Anarchist Counterculture

<p>Lacquer art has a long history in China, beginning more than 5,000 years ago. Richly decorated lacquer wares often invoke themes and ideas intended to bring wealth, health, moral ethics, good luck, longevity, and even immortality to their owners—and also communicate their wealth and status. Featuring works from Mia’s collection, this installation showcases a wide variety of forms, styles, and techniques, as well as an array of themes that remain significant in Chinese culture even today.</p>


Shimmering Surfaces: Chinese Lacquer Motifs and Techniques

<p>Hindsight presents a case for the decisive impact of women upon the history of documentary photography through a selection of prints drawn from Mia’s collection as well as that of Dan Shogren and Susan Meyer. Centering the work of six American photographers—Margaret Bourke-White, Esther Bubley, Imogen Cunningham, Dorothea Lange, Genevieve Naylor, and Marion Post Wolcott—the exhibition showcases images that were created for a diverse range of projects, from governmental commissions to editorial assignments. Meant to communicate with audiences increasingly attuned to global social and political movements, these photographs provide insight into lives both everyday and extraordinary: the routines of working people in Brazil; the impact of industrialization upon rural Americans; Black Americans’ experiences of racial segregation and economic inequality; the nonviolent political resistance of Mahatma Gandhi against British colonial rule. In these ways, Hindsight reveals each photographer’s power in the making of historical memory.</p>


Hindsight: American Documentary Photography, 1930-1950

<p>The 1960s marked a tumultuous period in the social, political, and cultural history of the United States. Amid a generational reckoning with racial injustice, authoritarian patriarchy, and an escalating war in Vietnam, San Francisco emerged as the primary locus for a youth-oriented, anti-establishment counterculture that embraced a progressive idealism, which included broad-minded acceptance of sexual expression and experimentation with mind-altering hallucinogens. Inventive forms of music and art flourished among the movement’s devotees, fueling the rise of what became known as psychedelic rock, a musical genre rooted in early blues, jazz, and folk-based rock. Dance concerts, often accompanied by light shows, became the principal venue for the new sound, while the concert poster was its promotional vehicle.</p>
<p>In 2019, Minneapolis collector Paul Maurer gave more than 200 concert posters to Mia&#8217;s permanent collection. Most of them date to the “golden age” of psychedelic poster design (1966–69) and were commissioned to promote rock acts performing at the leading San Francisco concert venues of the day. In celebration of this generous gift, Mia is presenting a selection of more than 25 eye-dazzling psychedelic posters created by the period’s leading concert-poster designers, including Rick Griffin, Alton Kelley, Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse, Wes Wilson, and Bob Fried.</p>
<div class="border-top-3" style="margin-top:30px">
<h2>Listen</h2>
<p>to some of the musicians promoted on the posters—including live concert recordings—on <a href="https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5wyREIzOH2OFA6hQj5qdST">Mia’s Sixties Psychedelia playlist on Spotify</a>.  </p>
<p><iframe loading="lazy" src="https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/5wyREIzOH2OFA6hQj5qdST?theme=0" width="100%" height="380" frameBorder="0" allowtransparency="true" allow="encrypted-media"></iframe></p>
</div>


2019.59.27

Sixties Psychedelia: San Francisco Rock Posters from the Paul Maurer Collection

<p><span style="font-size:x-large">Explore Mia’s collection of Pueblo art highlighting Keresan, Tewa, Towa, and Hopi voices and culture. Curated by Juan Lucero (Isleta Pueblo), Mia’s Mdewakanton Native Art Fellow, this exhibition transports visitors to the oldest villages in the United States for a <em>parska</em> (in Keresan) or <em>shada</em> (in Tewa) community dance. Over 40 works of art—watercolor paintings, bow guards, <em>manta</em> weavings, ceramics, and Hopi <em>katsinam</em> dolls—come together to create one ceremonial spirit. Through the breath of memory and longing, you can experience the emotions of distant drums and songs as you travel from Grandma’s house to the ceremonial plaza. There, sights and sounds create kinship, family, and tradition to be handed from generation to generation. </span></p>
<div style="margin-top:40px">
<a href="https://shakopeedakota.org/"><img loading="lazy" class="alignnone wp-image-72159" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/09101927/SMSC_Imprints-01_black.eps_.jpg" alt="" width="387" height="125" /></a>
</div>


Parska/Shada

<p>This exhibition highlights 50 years of photographic expression by a diverse roster of artists working within, against, and beyond the history of the medium: Nona Faustine, Martine Gutierrez, Deana Lawson, An-My Lê, Rania Matar, Lorraine O’Grady, Adrian Piper, Selma Fernandez Richter, Martha Rosler, Nona Faustine, Mickalene Thomas, Carrie Mae Weems, and Carmen Winant. </p>
<p>Spanning the past half-century in modern and contemporary photography, these photographs contend with many of the period’s defining issues, especially within the United States. They meditate on the intersection of personal and political histories, freshly interrogate matters of national identity and belonging, reflect on cycles of trauma and healing, and imagine worlds beyond the inequalities of our time.</p>
<p><a href="https://collections.artsmia.org/exhibitions/2866/in-her-view/room/all"><button class="background-black"> Explore the Exhibition</button></a></p>


2019.26

In Her View

<p>The tradition of English watercolor began in the 1700s. It started with a topographical bent, but quickly evolved into a poetic world steeped in beauty, the wonder of nature, and often a search for a romantic past. Artists looked to ancient castles, modest cottages, stony cliffs, and quiet back roads all over their country and occasionally beyond. We might think of these works as forerunners to the escapist pleasures of travel and nature shows so popular on TV today. </p>


96.83.2 British Watercolor Landscapes

<p>This immersive experience celebrates the futuristic worlds created by multidisciplinary artist Virgil Ortiz (Cochiti Pueblo). Ortiz creates mythical superheroes living in the year 2180 from video, hand-coiled ceramics, lithographs, and photography. The warrior figures imagined by Ortiz transcend time and space. These characters are inspired by the largest uprising in North American history: in 1680, Pueblo communities banded together to defeat a brutal colonial Spanish regime in the Southwest. This past informs the future in Ortiz’s 1680/2180 series, and offers contemporary Pueblo people sources of strength for creating future realities that recognize Pueblo sovereignty and survival. </p>


Virgil Ortiz: Convergence

<p>The exhibition features works from the Council of Black Male Success Rites of Passage, a program of the Cultural Wellness Center. Your experience in this gallery results from a collaboration between Mia and the <a href="http://www.culturalwellnesscenter.org/">Cultural Wellness Center</a>. The perspective labels were authored by Cultural Wellness Center faculty: Seba Ahmad Azzahir, Elder Atum Azzahir, Brother Minkara Tezet, the Council for Black Male Success.</p>
<p>Brother Minkara Tezet writes: “At the Cultural Wellness Center, we stress the capacity of Africans to produce knowledge, to have authority over knowledge, and to place significant pressure on dominant societies, institutions, and communities to accurately credit the source and impact of this knowledge. To our Ancestors, the Metu Neturu is a unique form of symbolic writing and thinking. Symbolic thinking reflects and illustrates the dynamic process of divine thought. Each sign is a symbol that reveals its true meaning only to initiated readers by means of a divinely inspired process. After 500 years, the African is returning to our original ways of knowing and being in creation.”</p>


Words that Presence the Divine: Tezet Metu

<p>Mia’s Artist in Respite program was created to connect local working artists with families, nature, and their own art practice. In summer of 2021, four local artists partnered with Mia and Camp Bovey in Northwestern Wisconsin to deliver engaging art projects inspired by works in Mia’s collection.  </p>
<p>Artists spent two days working with the staff and families at Bovey to create art and explore different artistic themes.  Artists then spent two additional days enjoying respite and time to explore their personal practice on Camp Bovey’s beautiful grounds. This combination of working and resting was designed to provide artists with funding to bring their whole selves to, and thrive within, their personal artistic practice and life. </p>
<p>Established in 1949, Camp Bovey is a program of East Side Neighborhood Services that has served youth and families in Northeast, Southeast, and North Minneapolis for over 70 years.  Camp Bovey is located on the traditional lands of Anishinaabe peoples in rural Wisconsin, about three hours from the Twin Cities.  Camp Bovey provides an opportunity for BIPOC families find connection, rest, and joy in nature.</p>


Mia&#8217;s Artist in Respite

<p>Artist in Residence (AiR) 2021 offered creative exploration, growth, and connection to our neighboring Minneapolis communities. Co-hosted by Minneapolis Parks &amp; Recreation Board staff, AiR 2021 was co-created with local artists (Courtney Cochran, Bayou a.k.a. Donald Thomas, Graci Horne, Maggie LaMorie, Ron Brown, Jordan Hamilton, Baki Baki Baki, Keegan Xavi, Gustavo Boada, and Madeline Helling), Mia’s Art in the Park program (Crystal Celeste Price), and Hope Community’s Parks and Power program (Shruthi Kamisetty and Carmen Bustamante).</p>
<p>Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC), queer, trans, young, and women artist leads shaped the content, themes, and structure of arts-based programming across Minneapolis Parks, reflecting a legacy of creative and joyful alternatives to the history of harm done in these public spaces. Through AiR 2021, this multi-partner collaboration brought art-making centered on relationship-building through resource and creative skill-sharing to the city parks.</p>


Calendar

Monday, October 18, 2021

…loading

Featured Events

Virtual Public Tour: Inspired by Books

Virtual Conversation: Within, Between, and Beyond

Virtual Public Tour: Current Conversations

Calendar

Monday, October 18, 2021

…loading

Ongoing Exhibitions

Captive Beauties: Depictions of Women in Late Imperial China

Leslie Barlow: Within, Between, and Beyond

In the Presence of Our Ancestors: Southern Perspectives in African American Art