SEATTLE, WA—The Henry, dedicated to contemporary art and ideas, is pleased to announce its Summer/Fall 2022 lineup. Exhibitions explore a diverse spectrum of ideas: identity, representation, and celebrity; land relations and place-making; notions of care, trauma, and healing; and cycles of time, decay, and regeneration.
everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt. features moving image installations drawn from the Henry collection, with works by seminal artists like Sue de Beer, Rashid Johnson, and Kaari Upson.Henry OffSite, now in its second year, will move into Volunteer Park with site-specific work by conceptual artist Chloë Bass. Nina Chanel Abney's paintings and collages explore themes of politics, race, sexuality, and celebrity. Ongoing exhibitions include a major new commission by Donna Huanca, ektor garcia's site-specific project matéria prima, and Math Bass's continuation of a picture stuck in the mirror.
Programmatic activations as well as digital and printed publications will accompany each exhibition.
2022 Summer/Fall Exhibitions
Kaari Upson, Split Eye [still], 2021 – 2017. HD video, color, sound. Henry Art Gallery, purchased with funds from The Buddy Taub Foundation, 2020.6.
everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt.
July 23, 2022 – January 8, 2023
This exhibition of moving image installations, drawn from the Henry collection, spans a wide range of style and conceptual approaches. The title references Kurt Vonnegut’s seminal anti-war novel Slaughterhouse-Five, a non-linear, meta-fictional narrative in which the protagonist struggles to come to terms with the devastating realities of human existence. Artists include Lutz Bacher, Sue de Beer, Candice Breitz, Nayland Blake, Guy Ben-Ner, Slater Bradley, Dora García, Rashid Johnson, Shirin Neshat, Kaari Upson, and Gillian Wearing. Read more.
Henry OffSite – Chloë Bass: Soft Services
August 12, 2022 – August 2023
Chloë Bass (b. 1984, New York) is a multiform conceptual artist based in New York and St. Louis. Her work in performance, installation, text, and social practice investigates the potential of daily life as a catalyst for intimacy, scaled from individuals to groups. Originally trained as a theater director and influenced by the avant-garde work of playwright Bertolt Brecht, Bass embraces the idea of alienation: the discomfort that arises from calling attention to structure, and the things that we do without thinking, through naming or pointing. For Bass’s project, commissioned and organized by the Henry, a series of fourteen stone benches are placed throughout Seattle’s Volunteer Park with two additional sculptures residing outside the Henry itself. Read more.
yəhaw̓
Opens September 17, 2022
The Henry is honored to partner with yəhaw̓, a Seattle-based Indigenous arts collective with a mission to help improve Indigenous mental and emotional health outcomes through art-making, community building, and equitable creative opportunities for personal and professional growth. Their network consists of hundreds of artists working across Coast Salish territories, and they center Indigenous voices, particularly those of women, Two Spirit, and young people. To foreground the desire for liberation that is part of yəhaw̓’s creative practices, their community installation will draw attention to the lobby gallery’s windows and the sky outside, as well as feature elements within the space that encourage visitors to experience light and sun with new awareness. Read more.
Nina Chanel Abney
October 1, 2022 – February 5, 2023
Nina Chanel Abney (b. 1982, Chicago, IL) makes paintings, prints, and large-scale murals with layered compositions and fragmented narratives that explore themes of politics, race, sexuality, and celebrity. Hard-edged, vibrant, and often dense with geometric symbols and shapes, her figural works are influenced by the dynamics of our contemporary media landscape. In recent paintings, Abney re-envisions the pastoral tradition in images with Black subjects at the center. The work is a celebration of Black self-sufficiency, sanctuary, and leisure, and reconsiders the entangled legacies of exploited labor, land use, and property that continue to shape United States society. Read more.
PNW x PNW
October 1, 2022 – February 5, 2023
The Pacific Northwest's scenery and geography are admired worldwide, but few have captured them so well as artists who have lived and worked in the region. This presentation of photographs, drawn from the Henry’s collection, includes works by Imogen Cunningham, Eirik Johnson, Mary Randlett, and Darius Reynolds Kinsey who show the area's beauty and character in ways that only locals can. Read more.
Please note that the following information is subject to change. Prior to publication, please email press@henryart.org to confirm dates, titles, and other information.
ABOUT THE HENRY
The Henry Art Gallery is internationally recognized for bold and challenging exhibitions, for being the first to premiere new works by established and emerging artists, and for highlighting contemporary art practice through a roster of multidisciplinary programs. Containing more than 27,000 works of art, the museum's permanent collection is a significant cultural resource available to scholars, researchers, and the general public. The Henry is located on the University of Washington campus in Seattle, Washington.