A painting with a varied green background. Two women seated in the foreground. Rosa Luxembourg on the left in black and white and period clothing seated on a bench and Alice Stevens on the right in muted colors.

May Stevens

My MothersOn View

January 26–July 30, 2023

May Stevens believed that politics and artmaking were intertwined. Through figurative paintings, collaged works, and political pop canvases, she criticized American patriarchy, championed the Civil Rights movement, and imbued Marxist ideals into everyday life. A self-proclaimed feminist and a founding member of both the Guerrilla Girls and the journal Heresies, Stevens understood class and gender as a fundamental unspoken element in art history and liberation movements. In My Mothers, the artist has paired her birth mother Alice Dick Stevens with her “spiritual mother” Marxist revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg. These paintings are tender explorations of both public and personal struggles; celebrations of revolution and public life; and demonstrations of the mundane.

Visitors experience Jace Clayton's installation of 40 speakers on plain wooden stands

Jace Clayton

They Are PartOn View

February 23–July 30, 2023

Jace Clayton creates multisensory experiences that explore the unexpected and conversational nature of music from around the world. Interested in how sounds have and define social meaning, Clayton pens musical compositions, creates new audio instruments, and constructs participatory installations. They Are Part brings together three of Clayton’s works that interweave memories, sound, and public spaces, to create what he describes as “those waves of magic that happen when the human spirit joins with technology.”

Ghost of a Dream

Yesterday is HereOn View

On view through summer 2023

For the grand opening of the MassArt Art Museum (MAAM) in February 2020, artist collective Ghost of a Dream transformed the new lobby with a site-specific installation titled Yesterday is Here. Ghost of a Dream's artwork centers on people’s hopes and dreams and is made from the ephemera they create in pursuit of those aspirations. In Yesterday is Here, the collective uses the past to create a new future for the Museum; the duo has cut up, combined, and spliced together images from over 30 years of exhibition catalogs and announcements from the MassArt Bakalar & Paine Galleries to create a kaleidoscopic look through the history of the Galleries and create an experience that speaks to MAAM’s future.

Last chance: On view January 26-29!
A 1983 baby monitor and box on a white background.
June 11–December 18, 2022
February 22, 2020–May 22, 2022

Colophon

The MAAM site is set in MAAM Sans drawn by Nick Sherman (MassArt ’06), Beatrice by Sharp Type, and Stellar by Pangram Pangram.

The site was designed by MassArt alumnæ at Moth Design, written by 43,000 Feet, and developed by pod consulting.

“Our People” shot by Dolphin Photography.