Art Exhibitions to Look Forward to in 2024
Saskia Jordá, Raíces (Roots) (detail), 2019. Felt, thread, cotton yarn, plaster, and wooden spools, 78 x 64 x 16 in.; Courtesy of the artist; © Saskia Jordá; Photo: Claire A. Warden
2024 is here and the world is as chaotic as ever. Many of the exhibitions on this list grapple with precarity and impending collapse, and perhaps even more importantly, underscore what that collapse might catalyze—the birth of a new idea, a germinating collaboration, or even nascent solutions to age-old problems. Others touch on examples from the past that can inform the present and make sense of what feels completely confusing and unintelligible—carving out meaning from the impenetrable bombardment of everyday noise. And others recognize artists who are long overdue for their flowers, correcting years of institutional negligence and rectifying the future of our respective art histories.
It’s difficult to remain optimistic about the role of art institutions in our world today. Despite this, I remain hopeful about the role of artists in disrupting what society encourages us to leave unquestioned. I am hopeful about dissent. I am thankful for artists whose work slowly changes us over time, resisting the endless acceleration of our culture. As a curator, this list reflects my personal choices for exhibitions I am looking forward to this year, hosted by traditional museums, nonprofit art spaces, and galleries.
This is by no means a comprehensive list of art exhibitions opening in 2024. Reach out to Intervenxions (Latinxproject@nyu.edu) with recommendations for potential future coverage.
The Ceremony Must Be Found: Ritual as Artistic Practice
Curated by: Anna Cahn
When: January 18, 2024–March 2, 2024
Where: The Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (EFA) Project Space, New York, NY
Artists: manuel arturo abreu, Marielys Burgos Meléndez, Dana Davenport, Caroline Garcia, Catalina Ouyang, Vivek Shraya, Qualeasha Wood
Marielys Burgos Meléndez, Invocations: Oshún (Río Espíritu Santo, El Yunque, Puerto Rico), 2021/2023, Multimedia Dance/ Ritual Installation, Dimensions variable, Concept, Ritual, Text & Narration: Marielys Burgos Meléndez, Photography by Paola López
Although imposed hierarchies and formal constraints in cultural production are dissolving, rituals remain a crucial part of what it means to be human. Social and spiritual processes like rituals and ceremonies hold meaning for so many of us and are not always inherited from the top down. The Ceremony Must Be Found proposes that rituals can be inventive processes of healing and encourage recurring critical reflection. Informed by feminist and decolonial theory, this exhibition features seven artists galvanized by the possibilities of actions performed according to a prescribed order, in service of greater truths.
Visit EFA Project Space, a program of The Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, at 323 W 39th St, 2nd floor, New York, NY, 10018.
Go Tell it on the Mountain: Black Folx and Their Church
Curated by: Alyssa Alexander
When: February 22, 2024–March 23, 2024
Where: Swivel Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Artists: Joseph Cochran II, Adama Delphine Fawundu, Lloyd Foster, Xayvier Haughton, Y. Malik Jalal, Devin B. Johnson, Basil Kincaid, Le’Andra LeSeur, Joe Minter, Ambrose Rhapsody Murray, Lamar Robillard, z tye richardson, Shikeith, Nyugen Smith, Renée Stout, Chiffon Thomas
Bringing together a diverse group of intergenerational Black artists, Go Tell it on the Mountain examines the complex relationships that Black folks hold with different religions and belief systems in varying contexts and across time. The exhibition’s title references the classic African-American Christmas carol, while also pointing to James Baldwin’s 1953 novel of the same name, in which a young Black queer protagonist comes of age in Harlem during the Great Depression, navigating the customs of the Pentecostal church. Using painting, photography, sculpture, and multimedia installation, the artists in Go Tell It on the Mountain explore broad themes of belonging, colonialism, power, and ritual as they intersect with Black religious traditions and spiritual values.
Visit Swivel Gallery at 396 Johnson Ave, Brooklyn, NY, 11206.
Simón Vega: Tropical Space Castaways
Curated by: Corinne Erni, Martha Stotsky, Kaitlin Halloran, Brianna L. Hernández and Casey Kleister Meyer
When: February 25, 2024–June 30, 2024
Where: Parrish Art Museum, Water Mill, NY
Inspired by the informal architectures of his home country of El Salvador and Central America more broadly, Simón Vega’s multimedia exhibition will be an exciting presentation at the Parrish Art Museum on Long Island. Assembled with found materials and wood, cardboard, plastic, and metal, Vega’s sculptural works seem to come from faraway worlds, ready for long-distance travel and weathering any possible storm. Seeing Vega’s works in context with the surrounding landscape will likely reveal surprising results, as the artist will be making new work using found materials from the area and working with local students on a collaborative project.
Visit Parrish Art Museum at 279 Montauk Hwy, Water Mill, NY, 11976.
Paloma Contreras Lomas and Ines Doujak
Curated by: Manuela Moscoso, Rahul Gudipudi, Agustin Schang, Marian Chudnovsky, Emmy Catedral
When: March 2, 2024–May 12, 2024
Where: Center for Art, Research and Alliances (CARA), New York, NY
Paloma Contreras Lomas, Doctorina Monroe, 2020. Photograph by Sergio López. Courtesy of Pequod Co.
In the spirit of political satire and punk subcultures, the unconventional works of Paloma Contreras Lomas and Ines Doujak will be on view together in a two-person show and international, intergenerational conversation hosted by CARA in New York City. Incorporating drawing, illustration, sculpture, and film, their works dissolve rigid categories like gender under the guise of humor and the grotesque. Disrupting the implicit and explicit hierarchies of our heteropatriarchal society, the artists instead “claim everyone’s right to everything, using horizontality and abundance as strategies for resistance.” Both artists’ hyperbolic landscapes emphasize the understudied correlations between pop culture and violence, fantasy and fetish, and shock and irreverence.
Visit the Center for Art, Research and Alliances (CARA) at 225 W 13th St, New York, NY, 10011.
duendita: Sound River
Curated by: Natalia Viera Salgado
When: March 21, 2024–March 23, 2024
Where: Abrons Arts Center, New York, NY
duendita, Sound River, 2024. Photo: Alberto Vargas
Consisting of a series of performances incorporating songs, field recordings, and moving images, duendita’s Sound River will honor and highlight the resilience of New York City’s coastal communities in the face of climate catastrophe. This program begs the question: what might nonhuman elements say to us if we really took the time to listen? In a multimedia installation containing sounds and images from the South Bronx, Red Hook, and the Lower East Side, duendita will encourage the creation of a space for collective exhalation and contemplation. duendita is the collaborative project of Candace Camacho from Queens, NY.
Visit the Abrons Arts Center at 466 Grand St, New York, NY, 10002.
Layo Bright: Dawn and Dusk
Curated by: Amy Smith-Stewart
When: April 7, 2024–October 20, 2024
When: The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield, CT
Layo Bright, The Thorns and the Roses, 2022. Blown, fused, and crushed glass, pump, PVC pipe, water, and mixed media with custom wood pedestal; Fountain: 58 1/2 x 22 x 22 inches; Pedestal: 2 1/2 x 60 x 60 in.; Courtesy of the artist; Photo: Robert Heishman
In her first museum solo exhibition, Layo Bright will present glass and pottery sculptures from the last five years. Originally from Lagos, Nigeria, Bright is a radical, effervescent voice in sculpture. Her work touches on themes of matriarchal power and migration, while also emphasizing universal themes of life and death through the inclusion of flowers and other natural iconography. Currently a Visiting Artist at UrbanGlass in Brooklyn, NY, Bright is redefining the capacities of glass, a medium that carries broad yet significant spiritual and psychological connotations.
Visit The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum at 258 Main St, Ridgefield, CT, 06877.
New Worlds: Women to Watch 2024
Curated by: Virginia Treanor and Orin Zahra
When: April 14, 2024–August 11, 2024
Where: National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC
Artists: Irina Kirchuk, Saskia Jordá, Aimée Papazian, Nicki Green, April Banks, Meryl McMaster, Francisca Rojas Pohlhammer, Ana María Hernando, Randa Maroufi, Marianna Dixon Williams, Sophia Pompéry, Mona Cliff, Rajyashri Goody, Hannan Abu-Hussein, Irene Fenara, Ai Hasegawa, Daniela Rivera, SHAN Wallace, Alexis McGrigg, Eliza Naranjo Morse, Amanda Phingbodhipakkiya, Migiwa Orimo, Graciela Arias, Marina Vargas, Arely Morales, Noémie Goudal, Molly Vaughan, Sarah Ortegon
Saskia Jordá, Raíces (Roots), 2019. Felt, thread, cotton yarn, plaster, and wooden spools, 78 x 64 x 16 in.; Courtesy of the artist; © Saskia Jordá; Photo: Claire A. Warden
Presented every three years, the National Museum of Women in the Art’s exhibition of Women to Watch in 2024 will be its largest and most expansive to date. Including artists from around the world, the presentation will focus on six salient themes, including “ecologies,” “technologies,” and “collective forces,” which the museum’s global network of outreach committees developed. The exhibition will include several site-specific installations and will surely reveal unexpected connections across a wide range of ideas despite the geographical distances among artists.
Visit the National Museum of Women in the Arts at 1250 New York Ave NW, Washington, DC, 20005.
Bony Ramirez: Cattleya
Curated by: Elena C. Muñoz-Rodriguez
When: April 18, 2024–March 9, 2025
Where: The Newark Museum of Art, NJ
Bony Ramirez, Cattleya, 2024. Acrylic, soft oil pastel, color pencil, wallpaper, Bristol paper on wood panel, 96 in.; Courtesy of the artist; © Bony Ramirez; Photo: Daniel Greer
In his first museum solo exhibition featuring entirely new work, Bony Ramirez will mine the collection of the Newark Museum of Art, combining historical objects from the museum’s collection with his own surreal paintings and sculptures. Born in the Dominican Republic but based in Perth Amboy, NJ, Ramirez paints figures that bear traces of melancholy and colonial loss. Ramirez’s paintings nod to a diasporic point of view, while uniquely situated in a familiar vernacular that is nostalgic, sincere, and often rendered in vibrant color, relishing the reflectivity and flexibility of the medium. In this show, Ramirez’s practice will be in conversation with works by veteran artists Freddy Rodriguez and Melvin Edwards.
Visit The Newark Museum of Art at 49 Washington St, Newark, NJ, 07102.
Zilia Sánchez: Topologías / Topologies
Curated by: Gean Moreno and Stephanie Siedel
When: Apr 20, 2024–Oct 13, 2024
Where: Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, FL
Including 30 works by the artist spanning five decades, this major survey of Zilia Sánchez’s oeuvre at ICA Miami is a must-see. Known for her stretched canvas paintings that allude to the organic shapes of the human body as well as bodies of water, Sánchez was born in Cuba but has spent much of her life in Puerto Rico. This special exhibition will include a selection of her lesser-known earlier abstract paintings, which she made prior to the Cuban Revolution. Although institutional recognition of the artist came later in her life, Sánchez’s artistic legacy is firmly cemented in the history of Caribbean art, and this exhibition is a testament to that, especially in the context of Miami, one of the U.S.’s most Caribbean cities.
Visit ICA at 61 NE 41st St, Miami, FL, 33137.
Picturing the Border
Curated by: Nadiah Rivera Fellah
When: July 21, 2024–January 5, 2025
Where: The Cleveland Museum of Art, OH
Artists: Graciela Iturbide, Louis Carlos Bernal, Ricardo Valverde, George Rodriguez, Eniac Martínez, Lourdes Grobet, Susan Meiselas, Alex Webb, Laura Aguilar, Teddy Cruz and Fonna Forman, Guadalupe Rosales, Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello, Miguel Fernández de Castro, Zoe Leonard, Ada Trillo
Yrenia Cervantes,1990.Laura Aguilar (American,1959–2018).Gelatin silver print; image: 22.9 x 30.5 cm;paper: 27.9 x 35.6 cm.The Cleveland Museum of Art, Karl B. Goldfield Trust, 2023.10. © Laura Aguilar
Focusing on photography of the U.S.–Mexico border from the 1970s to the present, this exhibition will include images detailing various aspects of life at the border, including portraits, images of domestic spaces, documentarian imagery from protests and other moments of policing, as well as other narratives of migration. In highlighting the work of Latinx, Chicanx, and Mexican photographers, the exhibition aims to reproduce counternarratives that destabilize the xenophobic and often vilifying viewpoints toward migrants held by members of the U.S. status quo.
Visit The Cleveland Museum of Art at 11150 East Blvd, Cleveland, OH, 44106.
Native America: In Translation
Curated by: Wendy Red Star
When: August 4, 2024–January 5, 2025
Where: Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX
Artists: Rebecca Belmore, Nalikutaar Jacqueline Cleveland, Martine Gutierrez, Koyoltzintli, Duane Linklater, Guadalupe Maravilla, Marianne Nicolson
Martine Gutierrez, Queer Rage, Imagine Life-Size, and I’m Tyra, from the series Indigenous Woman, 2018. Framed digital C print, 42 x 28 in.; Courtesy of the artist and RYAN LEE Gallery, New York
Artist-curated exhibitions usually yield the most unexpected, entirely illuminating shows, breaking with tired conventions and institutional rhetoric. In this exhibition curated by the Portland-based artist Wendy Red Star, nine Indigenous artists will showcase works dealing broadly with issues of land justice, identity, and legacies of colonialism. Representing various Native nations and spanning diverse media, the artworks in the exhibition will examine the historical legacies of Indigenous groups in the Americas, while encouraging us to reformulate our own biased views of “America” today.
Visit Blanton Museum of Art at 200 E Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Austin, TX, 78712.
Alex Santana is a writer and curator with an interest in conceptual art, political intervention, and public participation. Currently based in New York but originally from Newark, New Jersey, she is currently Associate Editor at The Latinx Project.