The Met Announces Spring and Summer 2018 Exhibitions

Highlights of the upcoming 2018 exhibition season are:

Before/On/After: William Wegman and California Conceptualism

January 17 – July 15, 2018

William Wegman, Before/On/After (detail), 1972. Gelatin silver prints. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Vital Projects Fund Inc. Gift, through Joyce and Robert Menschel, 2016. © William Wegman, Courtesy the artist

Opening at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on January 17, the exhibition Before/On/After: William Wegman and California Conceptualism will survey Conceptual Art as it developed in Southern California in the 1970s. The show is occasioned by the artist William Wegman’s extraordinary recent gift to the Museum of 174 short videos that he made between 1970 and 1999—his entire career in the medium. A 90-minute selection of videos from this gift will be shown along with photographs and drawings by Wegman as well as drawings, prints, and photographs by his contemporaries in Southern California—John Baldessari, Vija Celmins, Douglas Huebler, Ed Ruscha, and others.

Birds of a Feather: Joseph Cornell's Homage to Juan Gris

January 23 – April 15, 2018

Joseph Cornell (American, 1903–1972). Homage to Juan Gris, 1953–54.
Box construction. Philadelphia Museum of Art, Purchased: John D. McIlhenny Fund. Art
© The Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY

On October 22, 1953, Joseph Cornell wrote in his diary: “Juan Gris/Janis Yesterday.” He was referring to the previous day’s outing, when, on one of his frequent trips to the gallery district in midtown Manhattan, Cornell visited the Sidney Janis Gallery on East 57th Street. Among a presentation of approximately 30 works by modern artists, one alone captivated Cornell—Juan Gris’s celebrated collage The Man at the Café (1914), which is now a promised gift to the Museum as part of the Leonard A. Lauder Cubist Collection.

Thomas Cole's Journey: Atlantic Crossings

January 30 – May 13, 2018

Thomas Cole (American, 1801–1848). View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm—The Oxbow (detail), 1836. Oil on canvas, 51 1/2 x 76 in. (130.8 x 193 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of Mrs. Russell Sage, 1908 (08.228)

Met Museum to Explore Transatlantic Career of Renowned Painter Thomas Cole

Exhibition Marks 200th Anniversary of the Artist’s Arrival in America

Celebrated as one of America’s preeminent landscape painters, Thomas Cole (1801–1848) was born in northern England at the start of the Industrial Revolution, emigrated to the United States in his youth, and traveled extensively throughout England and Italy as a young artist. He returned to America to create some of his most ambitious works and inspire a new generation of American artists, launching a national school of landscape art. Opening January 30 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the exhibition Thomas Cole’s Journey: Atlantic Crossings will examine, for the first time, the artist’s transatlantic career and engagement with European art. With Cole’s masterwork The Oxbow (1836) as its centerpiece, the exhibition will feature more than three dozen examples of his large-scale landscape paintings, oil studies, and works on paper. Consummate paintings by Cole will be juxtaposed with works by European masters including J. M. W. Turner and John Constable, among others, highlighting the dialogue between American and European artists and establishing Cole as a major figure in 19th-century landscape art within a global context. The exhibition marks the 200th anniversary of Cole’s arrival in America.

Leon Golub: Raw Nerve

February 6 – May 27, 2018

Leon Golub (American, 1922–2004). Gigantomachy II (detail), 1966. Acrylic on linen, 9 ft. 11 1/2 in. x 24 ft. 10 1/2 in. (303.5 x 758.2 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of The Nancy Spero and Leon Golub Foundation for the Arts and Stephen, Philip, and Paul Golub, 2016 (2016.696). © The Nancy Spero and Leon Golub Foundation for the Arts/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY

Opening February 6 at The Met Breuer, Leon Golub: Raw Nerve will present a selective survey of this groundbreaking artist’s work. Timed to celebrate the 2016 gift to The Met of the monumental painting Gigantomachy II (1966) from The Nancy Spero and Leon Golub Foundation for the Arts and Stephen, Philip, and Paul Golub, the exhibition will present highlights from Golub’s long, eminent career, drawn from distinguished private collections as well as the artist’s estate. Golub’s unflinching portrayals of power and brutality have profound relevance today, as does his belief in the ethical responsibility of the artist.

Diamond Mountains: Travel and Nostalgia in Korean Art

February 7 – May 20, 2018

Jeong Seon. Mount Geumgang Viewed from Danbal Ridge, leaf from the Album of Mount Geumgang, 1711. Ink and light color on silk. National Museum of Korea, Seoul, Treasure no. 1875

The Diamond Mountains — perhaps the most iconic and emotionally resonant site on the Korean peninsula — is the theme of an international loan exhibition that will open at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on February 6, 2018. Though the region has inspired cultural pride since ancient times, its present location in North Korea has kept it largely inaccessible in modern times. Featuring nearly 30 landscape paintings from the 18th century to the present—from delicately painted scrolls and screens to monumental modern and contemporary artworks — Diamond Mountains: Travel and Nostalgia in Korean Art will present the visual imagery of this emblematic site. The highlight of the exhibition will be an exquisite early 18th-century album — a designated Treasure from the National Museum of Korea—by the master painter Jeong Seon (1676–1759), who revolutionized Korean painting by breaking with conventional generic imagery and depicting native scenery. The exhibition is the first in the West on this important subject, and most of the works have never before been displayed in the United States.

William Eggleston: Los Alamos

February 14 – May 18, 2018

William Eggleston (American, born Memphis, Tennessee, 1939). Untitled, Memphis, 1965. Dye-transfer print, 17 11/16 x 11 15/16 in. (45 x 30.4 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Promised Gift of Jade Lau. © Eggleston Artistic Trust

The American photographer William Eggleston (born 1939) emerged in the early 1960s as a pioneer of modern color photography. Now, 50 years later, he is widely considered its greatest exemplar. Opening February 14 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, William Eggleston: Los Alamos features a landmark gift to the Museum by Jade Lau of the artist’s most extraordinary portfolio, Los Alamos, comprising 75 dye-transfer prints from color negatives made between 1965 and 1974. The exhibition marks the first time the series will be presented in its entirety in New York City.

The Poetry of Nature: Edo Paintings from the Fishbein-Bender Collection

February 27, 2018 – January 21, 2019

Maruyama Ōkyo (1733–1795), Two Deer beneath Maple Trees, 1787. Hanging scroll, color on silk. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fishbein-Bender Collection, Promised Gift of T. Richard Fishbein and Estelle P. Bender

Painting blossomed in Japan during the Edo period (1615–1868) as artists daringly experimented with conventional styles. The exhibition The Poetry of Nature: Edo Paintings from the Fishbein-Bender Collection, opening February 27 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, will trace the development of the major schools and movements of this fascinating era.

Golden Kingdoms: Luxury and Legacy in the Ancient Americas

February 28 – May 28, 2018

Pendant (detail), 1 B.C.–A.D. 700. Tolima, Colombia. Gold, 12 5/8 x 6 3/8 in. (32 x 16.2 cm). Museo de Oro, Banco de la República, Bogotá (O06061)

A major international loan exhibition featuring luxury arts created in the ancient Americas will go on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art beginning February 28. Showcasing more than 300 objects drawn from more than 50 museums in 12 countries, Golden Kingdoms: Luxury and Legacy in the Ancient Americas will trace the development of gold working and other luxury arts from Peru in the south to Mexico in the north from around 1200 B.C. to the arrival of Europeans in the early 16th century. Emphasizing specific places and moments of extraordinary artistic achievement, as well as the exchange of materials and aesthetic ideas across time and place, the exhibition will present a new understanding of ancient American art and culture—one based on indigenous ideas of value—and cast new light on the brilliance of ancient American artists and their legacy. The exhibition will feature spectacular works of art from recent archaeological excavations—crowns, pectorals, pendants, necklaces, ear and nose ornaments, rings, labrets, masks, mantles, goblets, vases, stelas, bells, mirrors, painted books, and more—that have rarely, if ever, left their country of origin.

Public Parks, Private Gardens: Paris to Provence

March 12 – July 29, 2018

Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926). The Parc Monceau (detail), 1878. Oil on canvas. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Mr. and Mrs. Henry Ittleson Jr. Purchase Fund, 1959 (59.142)

The Metropolitan Museum of Art will herald the coming of spring with the exhibition Public Parks, Private Gardens: Paris to Provence, opening March 12. Anchored by the encyclopedic holdings of The Met, it will illustrate the horticultural boom that reshaped much of the French landscape during the 19th century. As shiploads of exotic botanical specimens arrived from abroad and local nurserymen pursued hybridization, the availability and variety of plants and flowers grew exponentially, as did the interest in them. The opening up of formerly royal properties and the transformation of Paris during the Second Empire into a city of tree-lined boulevards and parks introduced public green spaces to be enjoyed as open-air salons, while suburbanites and country-house dwellers were inspired to cultivate their own flower gardens. By 1860, the French journalist Eugène Chapus could write: "One of the pronounced characteristics of our Parisian society is that . . . everyone in the middle class wants to have his little house with trees, roses, and dahlias, his big or little garden, his rural piece of the good life."

Like Life: Sculpture, Color, and the Body (1300-Now)

March 21 – July 22, 2018

Greer Lankton (American, 1958-1996). Rachel (detail), 1986. Papier-mâché, metal plates, wire, acrylic paint, and matte medium. 28 × 21 × 11 in. (71.1 × 53.3 × 27.9 cm). Collection Eric Ceputis and David W. Williams, promised gift to the Art Institute of Chicago

Seven hundred years of sculptural practice—from 14th-century Europe to the global present—will be examined anew in the groundbreaking exhibition Like Life: Sculpture, Color, and the Body (1300–Now). On view at The Met Breuer from March 21 through July 22, 2018, the exhibition will explore expanded narratives of sculpture through works in which artists have sought to replicate the literal, living presence of the human body. A major international loan exhibition of approximately 120 works, Like Life will draw on The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s rich collection of European sculpture and modern and contemporary art, while also featuring a selection of important works from national and international museums and private collections.

Visitors to Versailles (1682-1789)

April 16 – July 29, 2018

Charles-Gabriel Sauvage, called Lemire pere (1741–1827). Figure of Louis XVI and Benjamin Franklin, 1780–85. Porcelain, 12 3/4 x 9 1/2 x 6 in. (32.4 x 24.1 x 15.2 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of William H. Huntington, 1883 (83.2.260)

The palace of Versailles has attracted travelers since it was transformed under the direction of the Sun King, Louis XIV (1638–1715), from a simple hunting lodge into one of the most magnificent public courts of Europe. French and foreign travelers, royalty, dignitaries and ambassadors, artists, musicians, writers and philosophers, scientists, grand tourists and day-trippers alike, all flocked to the majestic royal palace surrounded by its extensive formal gardens. Opening April 16 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Visitors to Versailles (1682–1789) will track these many travelers from 1682, when Louis XIV moved his court to Versailles, up to 1789, when Louis XVI (1774–1792) and the royal family were forced to leave the palace and return to Paris.

Painted in Mexico, 1700-1790: Pinxit Mexici

April 24 – July 22, 2018

Juan Patricio Morlete Ruiz (Mexican, 1713–1772). Portrait of Doña Tomasa Durán López de Cárdenas (detail), c. 1762. Galería Coloniart, Collection of Felipe Siegel, Anna and Andrés Siegel, Mexico City. Photo © Rafael Doniz

The vitality and inventiveness of artists in 18th-century New Spain (Mexico) is the focus of the exhibition Painted in Mexico, 1700–1790: Pinxit Mexici, opening April 24 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Through some 112 works of art (primarily paintings), many of which are unpublished and newly restored, the exhibition will survey the most important artists and stylistic developments of the period and highlight the emergence of new pictorial genres and subjects. Painted in Mexico, 1700–1790 is the first major exhibition devoted to this neglected topic.

Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination

May 10 – October 8, 2018

Image 1 (left): El Greco, Cardinal Fernando Niño de Guevara (1541–1609), ca. 1600, oil on canvas; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, H. O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929 (29.100.5); Image © Metropolitan Museum of Art
Image 2 (right): Evening Coat, Cristobal Balenciaga for House of Balenciaga, autumn/winter 1954–55; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Bryon C. Foy, 1957 (C.I.57.29.8); Image courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Digital Composite Scan by Katerina Jebb

Costume Institute Benefit on May 7 with Co-Chairs Amal Clooney, Rihanna, Donatella Versace, and Anna Wintour, and Honorary Chairs Christine and Stephen A. Schwarzman

(New York, November 8, 2017)—The Metropolitan Museum of Art announced today that The Costume Institute's spring 2018 exhibition will be Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination, on view from May 10 through October 8, 2018 (preceded on May 7 by The Costume Institute Benefit). Presented at The Met Fifth Avenue in both the medieval galleries and the Anna Wintour Costume Center, the show will also occupy The Met Cloisters, creating a trio of distinct gallery locations. The thematic exhibition will feature a dialogue between fashion and masterworks of religious art in The Met collection to examine fashion's ongoing engagement with the devotional practices and traditions of Catholicism. A group of papal robes and accessories from the Vatican will travel to the United States to serve as the cornerstone of the exhibition, highlighting the enduring influence of liturgical vestments on designers.

History Refused to Die: Highlights from the Souls Grown Deep Foundation Gift

May 22 – September 23, 2018

Thornton Dial (American, 1928–2016). History Refused to Die (detail), 2004. Okra stalks and roots, clothing, collaged drawings, tin, wire, steel, Masonite, steel chain, enamel, spray paint, 8 ft. 6 in. x 87 in. x 23 in. (259.1 x 221 x 58.4 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of Souls Grown Deep Foundation from the William S. Arnett Collection, 2014 (2014.548.1). © Thornton Dial

Opening May 22 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, History Refused to Die: Highlights from the Souls Grown Deep Foundation Gift will present 30 paintings, sculptures, drawings, and quilts by self-taught contemporary African American artists to celebrate the 2014 gift to The Met of works of art from the Souls Grown Deep Foundation. The artists represented by this generous donation all hail from the American South, primarily Alabama and Florida.

Obsession: Nudes by Klimt, Schiele, and Picasso from the Scofield Thayer Collection

July 3 – October 7, 2018

Egon Schiele (Austrian, 1890–1918). Standing Nude with Orange Drapery ​(detail), 1914. Watercolor, gouache, and graphite on paper, 18 1/4 x 12 in. (46.4 x 30.5 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Bequest of Scofield Thayer, 1982 (1984.433.315ab)

At The Met Breuer this summer, the exhibition Obsession: Nudes by Klimt, Schiele, and Picasso from the Scofield Thayer Collection will present a selection of some 50 works from The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Scofield Thayer Collection—which is best known for its paintings by artists of the school of Paris—along with a brilliant group of erotic and evocative watercolors, drawings, and prints by Gustave Klimt, Egon Schiele, and Pablo Picasso, whose subjects, except for a handful, are nudes. Opening July 3, the exhibition marks the first time these works are being shown together, providing a focused look at this important collection; it also marks the centenary of the death of Klimt and Schiele.