Renowned Portuguese artist Joana Vasconcelos premieres a new monumental site-specific installation. Known for her unprecedented multimedia works, Vasconcelos, in her first U.S. solo show, honors Elizabeth “Mumbet” Freeman, an enslaved woman whose court battle for her freedom in 1781 helped make slavery illegal in Massachusetts. The large-scale installation entitled Valkyrie Mumbet, is the newest in her Valkyries series, named after Norse female war goddesses, which pays homage to inspiring women.

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.