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High Museum of Art to present major Julie Mehretu Exhibition this fall
The first-ever comprehensive survey of Mehretu’s career covers two decades of the artist’s work and features many of her monumental paintings.
This fall, the High Museum will present “Julie Mehretu”(Oct. 24, 2020-Jan. 31, 2021), a major traveling exhibition of work by Julie Mehretu (born 1970, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia) co-organized by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and the Whitney Museum of American Art. This is the first comprehensive survey of the artist’s career, covering more than two decades of her work, from 1996 to the present, and uniting nearly 40 drawings and prints and 35 paintings predominantly monumental in size and scale.
Mehretu’s work bears witness to the shaping of human consciousness through the combination and reconfiguration of sources and images that address history and its intersection with the present. Her process involves compiling a vast and diverse archive of sources, including diagrams and maps, cave markings, Chinese calligraphy, architectural renderings, graffiti, photojournalism and texts. The exhibition also reveals the centrality of drawing in Mehretu’s artistic practice, from her diminutive drawings made in the 1990s to her monumental paintings of the 2000s, and explores the abiding influences of indexing, diagramming, and mapping as well as their techniques, aesthetics, and ideologies.
Mehretu’s work of the past decade draws from present-day images of natural disasters, human rights atrocities and global conflicts. Her most recent work in the exhibition refers to the detention camps holding migrant children along the southern border of the United States and is often scaled to the size and reach of her body. This correspondence between the artist’s body and her distinctly physical application of paint (and erasure of objective imagery), in combination with fragmented images produced in drawing, printmaking and stenciling techniques, lend the recent work a palpable sense of urgency and poignancy.
A highlight of the exhibition is Mehretu’s cycle of four monumentally scaled paintings titled “Mogamma (A Painting in Four Parts)” (2012). Reunited for the first time since they were last shown together in 2013, “Mogamma” interrogates themes of migration, revolution, global capitalism and technology at the dawn of the Arab Spring. Each painting in the cycle belongs to four different museums across three continents. The High Museum of Art acquired “Mogamma (Part 2)” in 2013.
“We are grateful for the opportunity to present this sweeping examination of Mehretu’s dynamic, multi-faceted career,” said Rand Suffolk, Nancy and Holcombe T. Green, Jr., director of the High. “The globally conscience themes in her work align strongly with our commitment to celebrating diverse perspectives through the High’s collection and exhibition program. We look forward to offering our audiences a chance to experience a broad spectrum of her creative genius.”
“Julie Mehretu is one of the most consequential artists in the first quarter of this century,” said Michael Rooks, Wieland Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, “. . . because she has managed to synthesize histories told and untold, and history in the making, with our present moment beset by dislocation and turmoil. Among the histories with which she contends is the history of visual culture, particularly the language of abstraction, which powerfully expresses the fragmentation, splintering, formation, and reformation of our present moment.”
“Julie Mehretu” considers the artist’s excavation of the histories of art, architecture, and past civilizations and addresses themes in her work such as migration, revolution, human rights, social justice, climate change and global capitalism. Additionally, the exhibition considers Mehretu’s career in printmaking through a selection of works produced with such techniques as etching, photogravure, aquatint and engraving. In its combination of media, the exhibition draws attention to the artist’s agility in radically shifting scale, moving from the intimate to the grand and from the personal to the universal. The exhibition will also include British artist Tacita Dean’s 2011 filmic portrait of Mehretu titled “GDGDA.”
Previously on view at LACMA (Nov. 3, 2019-Sept. 7, 2020), the exhibition will travel to the Whitney Museum of American Art (March 19-Aug. 8, 2021) and the Walker Art Center (Oct. 16, 2021-March 6, 2022) following its presentation at the High.
In early works such as “Untitled (two)” (1996), “Map Paint (white)” (1996) and “Untitled (yellow with ellipses)” (1998), Mehretu explores how to represent the cumulative effect of time by layering materials. In these paintings, she has embedded drawings between layers of poured paint, creating fossilized topographies.
Squares), 2014, felt-tipped marker and colored pencil on paper. High Museum of Art,
gift of the estate of Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian and Haines Gallery, San
Francisco, 2019. 173. © Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian
In “Stadia II” (2004) and “Black City” (2007), Mehretu interrogates sports and military typologies to disrupt modern conceptions of leisure, labor and order. The coliseum, amphitheater and stadium in “Stadia II”represent spaces designed to accommodate and organize large numbers of people but that also contain an undercurrent of chaos and violence. While “Stadia II”is filled with curved lines and an array of pageantry such as flags, banners, lights and seating, “Black City” is more linear and contains references to the military and war, including general stars and Nazi bunkers. Both works call attention to the ways in which modern culture and the spectacle of contemporary wars, such as the War on Terror and the Iraq War, are connected to imperialism, patriarchy and power.
The four-part “Mogamma” (2012) took significant inspiration from the 2011 Egyptian revolution, part of the Arab Spring of uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa. The work was named after a government administrative building on Tahrir Square that was seen as a symbol of modernism and the country’s liberation from colonial occupation when it was first built in 1949. It was later associated with government corruption and bureaucracy before eventually serving as a revolutionary site. Mehretu began work on the four vertical canvases by exploring the densely layered environment of Tahrir Square, where an array of architectures — including structures built in Islamic, European and Cold War styles — coexist. She then created a web of drawings that combined the Brutalist architectural style of the Mogamma with details from other public squares associated with the revolutionary fervor of the Arab Spring, such as the amphitheater stairs and spiraling lights of Meskel Square in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and the midcentury high-rise buildings surrounding Zuccotti Park in New York. Over this, she layered drawings of global sites of public protest and change, such as Red Square in Moscow and Tiananmen Square in Beijing. “Mogamma” was installed in Documenta in 2012 and again in London in 2013. This exhibition reunites all four panels of the monumental painting and marks the first time the work has been shown in its entirety in the United States. Before traveling with the exhibition, “Part 2” had been on view at the High since the Museum acquired it in 2013.
Mehretu’s most recent paintings introduce bold gestural marks and employ a dynamic range of techniques such as airbrushing and screenprinting. The works draw on her archive of images of global horrors, crises, protests and abuses of power, which she digitally blurs, crops and rescales. She uses this source material as the foundation for her paintings, overlaying the images with calligraphic strokes and loose drawings. For example, “Conjured Parts (eye), Ferguson” (2016) links disembodied anatomy with a site of violence and political strife. The painting began with a blurred photograph of an unarmed man with his hands up facing a group of police officers in riot gear, which was taken during the protests following the fatal shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Mehretu layered color over a blurry, sanded black-and-gray background; fuchsia and peachy-pink areas rise from below while toxic green tones float above like distant skies drawing near. Outlines of eyes, buttocks and other body parts appear within the graffiti-like marks and black blots hovering over smoky areas, suggesting human activity obscured.
In “Hineni (E. 3:4)” (2018), Mehretu addresses the fires caused by climate change and the intentional burning of Rohingya homes in Myanmar as part of a campaign of ethnic cleansing. The painting is based on an image from the 2017 Northern California wildfires, while the word “hineni” in the title translates to “here I am” in Hebrew, which was the biblical prophet Moses’s response to Yahweh (God), who called his name from within the burning bush. By interrogating three types of fires in this painting — one environmental, one intentional and one prophetic — Mehretu explores the contradictory meanings of a single elemental force.
Installed alongside these recent paintings, “Epigraph, Damascus” (2016) is a notable achievement in printmaking for Mehretu, representing a new integration of architectural drawings and painting overlaid with an unprecedented array of marks. Working closely with master printer Niels Borch Jensen, Mehretu used photogravure, a 19th-century technique that fuses photography with etching. She built the foundation of the print on a blurred photograph layered with hand-drawn images of buildings in Damascus, Syria, then composited that with a layer of gestural marks made on large sheets of Mylar. On a second plate, she executed her characteristic variety of light-handed brushstrokes, innovatively using techniques known as aquatint and open bite.
Many of Mehretu’s large-scale works will be on view throughout the galleries. The artist is known to create large horizontal canvases full of layered drawings to work out complexities of scale, size, detail and expanse. These panoramas often take on monolithic or compressed themes and histories such as African liberation movements and the architecture of spectacle.
The exhibition will also feature“Transcending: The New International” (2003). The painting began with a map of Ethiopia’s capital city, Addis Ababa, which Mehretu fused with maps of every African economic and political capital, creating a vast network of aerial views of the continent. In subsequent layers, she included drawings of both colonialist architecture in Africa and iconic modernist buildings erected there during and after liberation. In the center of the painting, she layered drawings of the many African plazas of independence with idiosyncratic markings she has called “characters.” Here, these characters stage battles, migrate, form alliances, congregate and ultimately participate in a system of entropy.
“Julie Mehretu” will be on view in the Cousins Special Exhibition Galleries on the Second Level of the High’s Wieland Pavilion.
About Julie Mehretu
Mehretu (born 1970, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia) immigrated with her family to the United States in 1977 and was raised in Michigan. She received a bachelor’s degree in art from Kalamazoo College, Michigan; studied at Université Cheikh Anta Diop, Dakar, Senegal; and received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1997.
In 2017, Mehretu unveiled a major new commission of two vastly large site-specific paintings at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, California. Her work has been shown in other recent exhibitions at Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy (2019); Kettle’s Yard at the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom (2019); Fundacion Botín, Santander, Spain (2018); Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto, Portugal (2017); the Modern Art Museu, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (2016); the Guggenheim Museum, New York (2010); and a major traveling show that began at MUSAC (Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León), Spain, in 2006 and traveled to the Kunstverein Hannover, Germany, and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebaek, Denmark, in 2007.
Her group exhibitions include Busan Biennial (2002); Istanbul Biennial (2003); Whitney Biennial (2004); São Paulo Biennial (2004); Carnegie International (2004-5); Sydney Biennial (2006); Prospect New Orleans (2008-9); The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York (2011); Documenta (2012); National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (2013); Dak’Art (2014); Biennial of Contemporary Art of Cartagena de Indias (2014); Museum of Modern Art, New York (2014); Sharjah Biennial (2015); and Venice Biennale (2019).
Mehretu is a recipient of many awards, including The MacArthur Award (2005) and the U.S. Department of State Medal of Arts Award (2015). She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and is represented by Marian Goodman Gallery in New York, where she lives and works.
Exhibition Catalogue
The exhibition is accompanied by a 320-page retrospective monograph of Mehretu’s work, featuring 455 color illustrations, that traces the development of one of America’s most celebrated abstract painters. Edited and featuring essays by exhibition curators Christine Y. Kim, Curator, Contemporary Art at LACMA, and Rujeko Hockley, Assistant Curator, Contemporary Art at Whitney Museum of American Art, the book includes numerous contributions by leading scholars and writers including Andrianna Campbell-LaFleur, Adrienne Edwards, Thelma Golden, Mathew Hale, Leslie Jones, Fred Moten and Dagmawi Woubshet.
Exhibition Organization and Support
This exhibition is organized by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. This exhibition is made possible by Premier Exhibition Series Sponsors Delta Air Lines, Inc. and Invesco QQQ; Exhibition Series Sponsor Northside Hospital; Premier Exhibition Series Supporters the Antinori Foundation, Sarah and Jim Kennedy, Louise Sams and Jerome Grilhot, and wish Foundation; Benefactor Exhibition Series Supporters Anne Cox Chambers Foundation and Robin and Hilton Howell; Ambassador Exhibition Series Supporter Rod and Kelly Westmoreland; and Contributing Exhibition Series Supporters Lucinda W. Bunnen, Marcia and John Donnell, W. Daniel Ebersole and Sarah Eby-Ebersole, Peggy Foreman, Mr. and Mrs. Baxter Jones, Margot and Danny McCaul, Joel Knox and Joan Marmo, and The Ron and Lisa Brill Family Charitable Trust. Generous support is also provided by the Alfred and Adele Davis Exhibition Endowment Fund, Anne Cox Chambers Exhibition Fund, Barbara Stewart Exhibition Fund, Dorothy Smith Hopkins Exhibition Endowment Fund, Eleanor McDonald Storza Exhibition Endowment Fund, The Fay and Barrett Howell Exhibition Fund, Forward Arts Foundation Exhibition Endowment Fund, Helen S. Lanier Endowment Fund, Isobel Anne Fraser–Nancy Fraser Parker Exhibition Endowment Fund, John H. and Wilhelmina D. Harland Exhibition Endowment Fund, Katherine Murphy Riley Special Exhibition Endowment Fund, Margaretta Taylor Exhibition Fund, and the RJR Nabisco Exhibition Endowment Fund.
The special exhibition of the Medford and Loraine Johnston Collection will run January 17 through May 25, 2025
In the mid-1970s, artist and Georgia State University professor Medford Johnston, along with his wife and collaborator Loraine, began collecting works by artists who were in the vanguard of contemporary art. Today, they hold one of the finest collections of postwar American drawings and related objects of its kind, now numbering more than 85 works.
In 2025, the High Museum of Art will present Thinking Eye, Seeing Mind: The Medford and Loraine Johnston Collection, featuring their collected works, which is a promised gift to the museum. Featuring artists such as Sol LeWitt, Brice Marden, Elizabeth Murray, Martin Puryear, Ed Ruscha, Al Taylor, Anne Truitt, Stanley Whitney and Terry Winters, among others, the exhibition will demonstrate how establishing the parameters of an art collection requires infinite patience, focus, discipline and a keen eye.
“The Johnstons have been friends of the High for a very long time. They’ve also built an impressive collection featuring works by many of the 20th century’s most significant abstract artists,” said the High’s Director Rand Suffolk. “We are honored that they have promised to leave their collection to the Museum where it will be preserved for future generations — and we are delighted that they are sharing it with our audiences now, hopefully inspiring the next generation of art collectors and supporters.”
A curated collection
The Johnstons’ story is a testament to, in the words of the High’s Wieland Family Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Michael Rooks, “knowing the difference between what is right and what is almost right” when building a collection.
Although the Johnstons acquired several paintings and objects when they first began collecting in 1972, they quickly narrowed their focus to drawing, primarily by artists working on the frontlines of abstraction in the mid-1960s during a time of great innovation and experimentation.
Rooks added, “Med and Loraine’s collection struck me at once by its single-minded focus on a specific moment in time, which was essentially the time of their contemporaries. The artists in their collection are like close friends to the Johnstons — in fact many are or were. What is equally astonishing about the collection is the Johnstons’ dogged pursuit of quality. Their in-depth knowledge of each artist’s practice combined with their understanding of specific qualities to look for — or more appropriately, to hold out for — will be a revelation to emerging collectors.”
The Johnstons have built their collection with the High in mind as the benefactor of their passion and discernment. For them, their collection “is a labor of love, pursued over more than 50 years, and we are delighted to be able to help the High Museum document and celebrate these important artists working during the same decades as our lives.”
About the exhibit
Thinking Eye, Seeing Mind: The Medford and Loraine Johnston Collection will be presented in the Special Exhibition Galleries on the second level of the High’s Stent Family Wing.
The exhibit is organized by the High Museum of Art and made possible through the generosity of sponsors:
- Premier Exhibition Series Sponsor Delta Air Lines, Inc.
- Premier Exhibition Series Supporters Mr. Joseph H. Boland, Jr., The Fay S. and W. Barrett Howell Family Foundation, Harry Norman Realtors and wish Foundation
- Benefactor Exhibition Series Supporters Robin and Hilton Howell
- Ambassador Exhibition Series Supporters Loomis Charitable Foundation and Mrs. Harriet H. Warren
- Contributing Exhibition Series Supporters Farideh and Al Azadi, Mary and Neil Johnson, Mr. and Mrs. Baxter Jones, Megan and Garrett Langley, Margot and Danny McCaul, Wade A. Rakes II and Nicholas Miller and Belinda Stanley-Majors and Dwayne Majors.
Support has also been provided by the Alfred and Adele Davis Exhibition Endowment Fund, Anne Cox Chambers Exhibition Fund, Barbara Stewart Exhibition Fund, Dorothy Smith Hopkins Exhibition Endowment Fund, Eleanor McDonald Storza Exhibition Endowment Fund, The Fay and Barrett Howell Exhibition Fund, Forward Arts Foundation Exhibition Endowment Fund, Helen S. Lanier Endowment Fund, John H. and Wilhelmina D. Harland Exhibition Endowment Fund, Katherine Murphy Riley Special Exhibition Endowment Fund, Margaretta Taylor Exhibition Fund, RJR Nabisco Exhibition Endowment Fund and USI Insurance Services.
About the High Museum of Art
Located in the heart of Atlanta, the High Museum of Art connects with audiences from across the Southeast and around the world through its distinguished collection, dynamic schedule of special exhibitions and engaging community-focused programs.
Housed within facilities designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architects Richard Meier and Renzo Piano, the High features a collection of more than 19,000 works of art, including an extensive anthology of 19th- and 20th-century American fine and decorative arts; major holdings of photography and folk and self-taught work, especially that of artists from the American South; burgeoning collections of modern and contemporary art, including paintings, sculpture, new media and design; a growing collection of African art, with work dating from prehistory through the present; and significant holdings of European paintings and works on paper.
The High is dedicated to reflecting the diversity of its communities and offering a variety of exhibitions and educational programs that engage visitors with the world of art, the lives of artists and the creative process.
For more information about the High or to purchase tickets, visit high.org.
Top image: (from the collection) Terry Winters (American, born 1949), Orb, 2020, oil on paper, The Johnston Collection. © Terry Winters, Courtesy Matthew Marks Gallery, New York.
This holiday season, Atlanta’s Center for Puppetry Arts is proud to present groundbreaking displays highlighting how puppetry — an ancient form of storytelling — brings together diverse religious and cultural traditions.
Running from November 12 to December 29, this special holiday exhibition invites visitors to experience a global celebration of unity — all under one roof.
Two remarkable exhibits at the heart of this year’s holiday programming are Jane Henson’s Nativity Story and The Famous Chelm Players by Robert Rogers. These powerful displays bring to life Christian and Jewish traditions through the art of puppetry, alongside contributions from other world cultures.
In addition to these new exhibits, the Center’s signature Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer™ performance returns, making the Center for Puppetry Arts a must-visit holiday destination.
A rare display of Christian artistry: Jane Henson’s Nativity Story
Jane Henson’s Nativity Story, a masterful crèche, brings the birth of Jesus to life through puppetry. Created by the co-founder of The Jim Henson Company (and wife of Muppets creator, Jim Henson), Nativity Story adds emotion to the traditional display, making it an engaging exhibit for all ages.
The Center for Puppetry Arts is one of the few museums in the world to publicly showcase Jane Henson’s work, offering a rare chance to experience her artistry. This unique celebration of Christian tradition is also a tribute to an often-overlooked female pioneer in puppetry.
A closer look: The Famous Chelm Players
Another highlight of the holiday exhibition is The Famous Chelm Players, created by renowned puppeteer Robert Rogers. These characters, inspired by Eastern European Jewish folklore, depict the Wise Men of Chelm, a town known in Jewish stories as the “village of fools.”
The puppets bring to life the lighthearted and well-meaning — yet comically misguided — characters who share wisdom and are used to tell stories about holidays and everyday lessons. They have been a beloved part of many Jewish traditions.
Designed with intricate detail, the Chelm puppets evoke the shtetls (small Jewish towns) of the past, capturing the essence of Jewish cultural heritage. Originally performed in Rogers’ New York playhouse, the debut at the Center for Puppetry Arts marks a rare opportunity for Southern audiences to see these whimsical puppets and learn about the timeless tales of Chelm.
A global holiday experience
In addition to these special exhibits, The Center maintains a rich collection of global puppetry in its permanent collection, some include:
• Puppets of Hindu deities, crafted by Indian artist Anupama Hoskere, depict stories from Hindu epics like the Ramayana, showcasing the intricate traditions of Indian puppetry.
• Muslim folk characters from various regions illustrate how puppetry has been used to convey religious stories and community traditions from the Middle East to Southeast Asia.
• Asian puppets, including shadow puppets from Indonesia and China, show how they are used in religious ceremonies and folk storytelling.
Rudolph returns for holiday fun
No visit to Atlanta’s Center for Puppetry Arts during the holidays would be complete without Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
Running fromNovember 13 to December 29, this family-friendly adaptation of the 1964 Rankin/Bass television special features fully staged puppetry performances that capture the timeless story of Rudolph, Santa, Yukon Cornelius and the Abominable Snowman.
An Invitation to All Faiths and Communities
The Center for Puppetry Arts is extending a warm invitation to religious and interfaith organizations to participate in this celebration of global traditions.
By bringing together these diverse stories, the Center is offering a rare chance for communities of all backgrounds to come together through the common love of art and storytelling.
Plan Your Visit
Dates: November 12–December 29; Performances of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer™ begin November 13.
Location: The Center For Puppetry Arts: 1404 Spring St NW, Atlanta, GA 30309. Parking is free.
For more information and to purchase tickets, visit: puppet.org/programs.
Rudolph performance tickets include the show, as well as admission to the Worlds of Puppetry Museum, Festive Features special exhibition and a Create-A-Puppet™ Workshop.
To purchase a membership, visit: puppet.org/visit/become-a-member.
About the Center for Puppetry Arts
The Center for Puppetry Arts is the largest nonprofit in the U.S. dedicated solely to puppetry, offering live performances, interactive workshops and a world-class museum. Home to the Jim Henson Collection, featuring original Muppets, Fraggle Rock characters and Sesame Street icons, the Center provides a rare, behind-the-scenes look at beloved TV and film favorites.
With over 4,000 puppets from around the world in the museum, the Center immerses visitors in diverse cultural traditions, making it a must-visit destination for families. Supported by local institutions, it remains a key player in Atlanta’s vibrant arts scene.
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