Reckonings: Fleming staff reflect on the collection and our current moment — September 15 - November 21, 2020. Image: Ronald Slayton (American, 1910-1992), Unemployment, c. 1935. Oil on homosote. Gift of Gary Michael 1983.27
INTERVENTION: toward an anti-racist, anti-imperialist, anti-colonialist African and Ancient Egyptian Gallery— September 15, 2020 - Ongoing. Image: View of the Fleming's African/ Ancient Egyptian Gallery.
Animal Transformations — January 21 - May 8, 2020. Image: United States, Scrimshaw, ca. 1870. Whalebone. Gift of Mrs. Frank Balch 1948.45.18
Reckonings: Fleming staff reflect on the collection and our current moment — September 15 - November 21, 2020. Image: Howard Chandler Christy (American, 1872-1952), Americans All!, 1919. Lithograph on paper. Gift of Beatrice Samuelson 1985.3.8
Contemporary Voices of Vermont — September 10, 2019 - May 8, 2020. Image: Wylie Garcia, Toast Can Never Be Bread Again (detail), 2016. Acrylic on canvas. Courtesy of the Artist
The Fleming Museum of Art presents several changing exhibitions annually, embodying a broad mix of styles, periods, and mediums. These exhibitions bring diverse examples of world-class art to Vermont, from historical icons such as Rembrandt and Picasso to international contemporary artists.
September 25 - November 21, 2020
Reckonings is an opportunity for the Museum’s staff and student interns to reflect on the past months of 2020 by engaging with objects from the collection. Staff members have written and signed their own labels about the artworks they’ve selected, with responses that are by turns thoughtful, vulnerable, creative, angry, sad, and hopeful—echoing the range of reactions we have all felt in these past months. Sometimes these objects take on new meanings as staff members draw inspired connections to other historic moments of disrupture. In other instances, the artworks are beacons for the kind of attention to care and racial justice that this moment demands of us. Through this process, the staff participated in the work we do with students and faculty when we bring them in conversation with the Fleming’s collection: how we use art to communicate to others what feels urgent to us.
Explore the exhibition: Reckonings: Fleming staff reflect on the collection and our current moment
Image: Manuel Álvarez Bravo (Mexican, 1902-2002), Margarita de Bonampak, printed 1977. Photograph on Agfa paper. Gift of Warren H. Bree in honor of Nancy A. Bree ’80 and Benjamin Aibel 1980.20.7
September 15, 2020 - Ongoing
The Fleming Museum’s African and Ancient Egyptian Gallery was installed almost thirty years ago. Outdated maps and labels reflect legacies of colonial collecting and scholarship, in which African art and cultural belongings are decontextualized and framed as curiosities or trophies. Throughout the Fall 2020 semester, we will be rolling out a series of new labels and quotes that acknowledge and share these critiques with our visitors. This intervention is a first step toward being transparent about the racist and imperialist foundations of the Fleming Museum and actively facilitating input from multiple perspectives. “Toward” is a key part of the title of this intervention; much work remains to be done in advance of an ambitious reinstallation of these collections in a new anti-racist, anti-imperialist, anti-colonialist gallery..
Explore the exhibition: INTERVENTION: toward an anti-racist, anti-imperialist, anti-colonialist African and Ancient Egyptian Gallery
Image: Ibeji Twin Figures, Collected 1968-1972. Wood, glass beads, black coloring. Gift of Mr. & Mrs. V. Stuart Foote. 1995.9.7.1-2
January 21 - November 21, 2020
Animal Transformations displays an array of animal-related objects from the Fleming’s extensive collections. Led by Professor Jennifer Dickinson and Manager of Collections and Exhibitions Margaret Tamulonis, UVM’s Spring 2019 Museum Anthropology class (ANTH 250) took on the topic of human/animal relations while working with the Museum’s collections. The students worked closely with objects from the Fleming’s collections, deciding which would best represent the spectrum of ways cultural meanings come alive through animal objects. The pieces in this collection were made to fulfill a variety of purposes, from the utilitarian to symbolic, everyday to extraordinary. Through this exhibition, the curators hope to give visitors a window into the many ways humans have transformed animal materials and imagery, from the installation itself to new labels in some of the Museum’s galleries that invite visitors to find animal transformations around them.
Explore the exhibition: Animal Transformations
Image: Japan, Rats, early 20th century. Ivory. Gift of Katherine Wolcott 1939.1.21
September 10, 2019 – November 21, 2020
The New England Gallery, located on the Marble Court balcony, features paintings by renowned Vermont artists from the Fleming Museum’s collection. The Contemporary Voices of Vermont series provides an opportunity to view the work of current Vermont artists within the historical context of their predecessors. This fall’s Contemporary Voices artist is Wylie Garcia.
Wylie Garcia’s paintings embrace markers of femininity and domesticity, such as pastel color palettes, marks that evoke embroidery stitches, lace-like veils, and flowing curves. Painting is a meditative and cathartic act for Garcia, who processes her emotional state and reactions to current events through her work.
Image: Wylie Garcia (American, born 1980), Toast Can Never Be Bread Again, 2016. Acrylic on canvas. Courtesy of the artist
