Pretty Raw takes the artist Helen Frankenthaler as a lens through which to refocus our vision of modernist art over the past 50 years. In this version, decoration, humor, femininity and masculinity, the everyday, pleasure, and authorial control take center stage. Artists from the 1950s through the present work in a range of mediums, finding personal, social and political meaning in sheer, gorgeous materiality.
Selected artists: Helen Frankenthaler, Grace Hartigan, Al Leslie, Dwight Ripley, Marie Menken, Larry Rivers, Jane Freilicher, Morris Louis, Jules Olitski, Sam Gilliam, Friedl Dzubas, Frank Bowling, Ralph Humphrey, Miriam Schapiro, Lynda Benglis, Faith Wilding, Harmony Hammond, Robin Mitchell, Judy Chicago, Robert Kushner, Mary Beth Edelson, Andy Warhol, Christopher Wool, Mike Kelley, Carroll Dunham, Wolfgang Tillmans, Polly Apfelbaum, Marilyn Minter, Kara Walker, Janine Antoni, Kathy Butterly, Mark Bradford, Jackie Saccoccio, Carrie Moyer, Hildur Ásgeirsdóttir Jónsson, Laura Owens, Mary Weatherford, Sterling Ruby, Jacqueline Humphries, Mark Barrow and Sarah Parke, Ulrike Müller, Josh Faught. Curated by Curator-at-Large Katy Siegel.
New Acquisitions gathers together objects that have entered the Rose's collection in the last 18 months. Major historical works by artists including Howardena Pindell, Sam Gilliam and Melvin Edwards demonstrate the Rose's commitment to diversifying its holdings in 20th century painting and sculpture by acquiring important works by figures who until recently have been excluded from canonical accounts of art history due to race and gender-based discrimination. Curated by Rose Director Chris Bedford, this exhibition focuses on abstract painting and sculpture by African Americans with an emphasis on work made in the 1970s.