Echoes: Reframing Collage

Echoes: Reframing Collage examines the parallels between Arnold’s work and 21st-century artists including Wardell Milan, Nathaniel Mary Quinn, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Ayanah Moor, Krista Franklin, and Xaviera Simmons. These artists not only reconceptualize the photocollage, they also build upon Arnold’s legacy as an artist whose medium and content reflected his multifaceted identity.

Highlights include works like Paul Mpagi Sepuya’s Mirror Study (Q5A3505) (2016). Sepuya’s process—tearing his prints into fragments, splitting the body parts of his models and collaging multiple prints—results in a photocollage that creates a singular, faceless subject, through the assemblage of multiple bodies. Wardell Milan’s Early Spring. The Charming Evening (2014) investigates intertwined personal and political histories. Renowned figures from politics, art history and pop culture stand beside family snapshots in the elaborate dioramas he builds to photograph, resulting in an intersectional assemblage exploring representations of race and gender.

MoCP is supported by Columbia College Chicago, the MoCP Advisory Board, the Museum Council, individuals, and private and corporate foundations. The 2017-2018 exhibition season is generously sponsored by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Efroymson Family Fund, and the Illinois Arts Council Agency. Support for Echoes: Reframing Collage is provided by a travel and research-specific grant from The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Echoes: Reframing Collage is part of Art Design Chicago, an exploration of Chicago’s art and design legacy, an initiative of the Terra Foundation for American Art with presenting partner The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation.