Gustav Klimt, the MAK, and Immendorf Castle: Burnt, Destroyed, Vanished?

 8 May 1945 not only marks the end of the Second World War and of the Nazi regime, but also stands for one of the greatest losses in cultural assets in Austrian history, triggered by a devastating fire that ravaged Immendorf Castle in Lower Austria. The 80th anniversary of these events occurs in 2025, reason enough for the MAK and the non-profit Klimt Foundation to mount an exhibition on the subject of Gustav Klimt, the MAK, and Immendorf Castle: Burnt, Destroyed, Vanished? 

Even today, the events surrounding the fire in the country seat of the Freudenthal family, which served as a valuable and seemingly safe art storage depot in the Second World War, have not been fully clarified. The exhibition offers profound insight into the sheer scale of the disaster. First mentioned in the 13th century, the castle was used from 1942 onwards as a place to store works of art in need of protection from the effects of war. The owner at the time, Baron Rudolf von Freudenthal, made rooms available for this purpose. 

Some sources suggest that the castle was deliberately set on fire by German troops—presumably the SS—in May 1945 in order to deprive the Red Army of the stored art objects. However, there is still no clear evidence of this to this day. Nor is it proven that Soviet soldiers were involved. Similarly—based on the facts as they stand—the occasional statements that individual Klimt paintings may have been removed from storage before the fire cannot be confirmed. 

In addition to the three faculty paintings for the Main Ceremonial Hall of the University of Vienna with the corresponding composition designs, the works that were burned include the overdoor paintings Music (1897/98) and Schubert at the Piano (1899) from the Palais of Nikolaus Dumba on Vienna’s Ringstraße as well as the paintings The Golden Apple Tree (1903), Farm 2 Garden with Crucifix (1912), Portrait of Wally (1916), Women Friends (1916/17), Garden Path with Chickens (1916), and Leda (1917) from the expropriated collection of August and Serena Lederer. The State Arts and Crafts Museum in Vienna (now the MAK) lost to the flames: the Laxenburg Room stored in Immendorf Castle, various East Asian and Islamic objects, arts and crafts from the early modern period, over fifty pieces of furniture, leather wallpaper, twelve carpets, and the Möchling Tomb, a wooden shrine carved in the shape of a Gothic church from the 15th century. 

Alongside original plans and a new architectural model of the castle, the exhibition will show a new film documentary on the events at Immendorf Castle with interviews with witnesses of the period. The film was directed and written by Peter Weinhäupl, Director of the Klimt Foundation, Vienna, and Stefan Kutzenberger, art historian and author. The film was made by the Danish filmmaker Rikke Kutzenberger. “Masterpieces of Reproduction Art,” which come from the valuable Klimt portfolios published in 1908–1914, 1917/18, and 1931, illustrate, partly in color, the inestimable loss of several original Klimt paintings. 

The Klimt Foundation is making available these and other loans from its collection. Original documents such as recovery lists kept at the MAK and valuable archive material from the Austrian Federal Monuments Office, the archive of the Künstlerhaus Vienna, and the Lower Austrian Provincial Library provide further profound insights into the events surrounding the supposedly safe rescue site of Immendorf Castle and enable an overall picture based on facts.

IMAGES

The fire ruins of Schloss Immendorf, ca. 1950 Private collection
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Postcard “Schloss Immendorf”, ca. 1940 Klimt-Foundation, Vienna
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Gustav Klimt, Jurisprudence, 1903
Photogravure from the portfolio The Work of Gustav Klimt, published by Kunstverlag Hugo Heller, Vienna/Leipzig, 1917/18
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Gustav Klimt, Philosophy, 1900−1907
Photogravure from the portfolio The Work of Gustav Klimt, published by Kunstverlag Hugo Heller, Vienna/Leipzig, 1917/18
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Gustav Klimt, Medicine, 1900−1907
Photogravure from the portfolio The Work of Gustav Klimt, published by Kunstverlag Hugo Heller, Vienna/Leipzig, 1917/18
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Gustav Klimt, Women Friends II, 1916/17
Color collotype from the portfolio Gustav Klimt. A Review, published by Max Eisler, Druck und Verlag
der Österreichischen Staatsdruckerei, Vienna, 1931
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Gustav Klimt, Hygieia—detail from the faculty painting Medicine, 1900−1907 Color collotype from the portfolio Gustav Klimt. A Review,
published by Max Eisler, Druck und Verlag
der Österreichischen Staatsdruckerei, Vienna, 1931
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Gustav Klimt, Garden Path with Chickens, 1916
Color collotype from the portfolio Gustav Klimt. A Review, published by Max Eisler, Druck und Verlag
der Österreichischen Staatsdruckerei, Vienna, 1931
© Klimt Foundation, Vienna

Renoir Drawings

 Morgan Library & Museum 

October 17, 2025, through February 8, 2026

 Musée d’Orsay 

March 17 to July 5, 2026

 This fall, the Morgan Library & Museum will present Renoir Drawings, the first comprehensive the exhibition explores Renoir’s engagement with draftsmanship across his long and influential career. Organized with the Musée d’Orsay, Paris, Renoir Drawings brings together over one hundred drawings, pastels, watercolors, prints, and paintings, inviting visitors to engage with Renoir’s creative process while offering insights into his artistic methods across five decades. While Renoir’s paintings have become icons of Impressionism, his drawings are less wellknown. Yet beginning in his earliest days as an artist-in-training and continuing until his very last years, Renoir regularly drew and painted on paper in a variety of media. 

Auguste Renoir (1841–1919), Portrait of a Girl (Elisabeth Maître), 1879. Pastel on Ingres paper. The Albertina Museum, Vienna – The Batliner Collection, DL535. 

The first comprehensive exhibition devoted to his drawings since Aquarelles, pastels et dessins par Renoir in 1921 at the Galeries Durand-Ruel, in Paris, Renoir Drawings assembles outstanding examples of all the media on paper in which Renoir worked, from pencil, pen and ink, chalk, pastel, and watercolor to etching and lithography. 

“Renoir’s drawings reveal an artist of tremendous sensitivity and range,” said Colin B. Bailey, curator of the exhibition and Katharine J. Rayner Director of the Morgan Library & Museum. “This exhibition brings together rarely seen works on paper to provide a more complete view of Renoir’s creative process, offering visitors a fresh perspective on one of the most well-known and influential painters of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” 

Renoir Drawings, the first exhibition at the Morgan to be curated by Dr. Bailey, coincides with his tenth anniversary as its director. He is a noted specialist in eighteenth-century French art and a recognized authority on Renoir. Renoir Drawings marks the culmination of many years of collaboration between the Morgan and the Musée d’Orsay, combining the Morgan’s dedication to presenting works on paper and records of the creative process with the extraordinary holdings of Renoir’s work from the Musée d’Orsay. With the exception of the period 1865– 1875, the decade in which Renoir—with Claude Monet, Alfred Sisley, and Camille Pissarro—pioneered the Impressionist method of working directly from nature without preliminary sketches, he created drawings throughout his working life. 

Thematic sections in the exhibition will cover the full span of Renoir’s career, ranging from academic studies he made as a student to on-the-spot impressions of contemporary urban and rural life, and from finished, formal portraits to intimate sketches of friends and family completed late in life. Mid-career, Renoir returned to a more traditional practice of preparatory studies. 

A number of his major paintings, along with one plaster sculpture, are reunited with their related drawings to illustrate his creative process. Inspired by the major gift to the Morgan in 2018 of a large-scale preparatory sketch for one of Renoir’s most significant paintings, 

Auguste Renoir (1841–1919), The Great Bathers, 1886–87. Oil on canvas. Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Mr. and Mrs. Carroll S. Tyson, Jr., Collection, 1963, 1963-116-13. 

Auguste Renoir (1841–1919), Study for “The Great Bathers,” ca. 1886–87. Red and white chalk, with smudging and blending, on paper mounted to canvas. The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, bequest of Drue Heinz; 2018.71. Photography by Graham Haber, 2018. 

The Great Bathers (1886–87), the exhibition presents this painting, on loan from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, alongside seven preparatory drawings. 

Another of his most ambitious figure paintings, Dance in theCountry (1883), is also on view, alongside seven related works on paper. 

Other highlights from the exhibition include Renoir’s drawings for publications, including for an illustrated edition of novelist Émile Zola’s L’Assommoir and for the periodical La Vie moderne, showing the ways in which he adapted his technique for different reproduction processes. 

Also on view are portraits of his inner circle, most notably of his wife, Aline Charigot, as well as of his young sons and their nursemaid, Gabrielle Renard. 

Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) and Richard Guino (1890–1973), The Judgement of Paris, 1914. Patinated plaster. GrandPalaisRmn (musée d’Orsay). Photography by René-Gabriel Ojéda. 

The exhibition concludes with the plaster sculpture The Judgement of Paris (1914), created in collaboration with sculptor Richard Guino, after arthritis severely limited Renoir’s use of his hands. 

Following the installation at the Morgan, Renoir Drawings will be on view at the Musée d’Orsay from March 17 to July 5, 2026. 

Organization and Sponsorship Organized by Colin B. Bailey, Katharine J. Rayner Director, and Sarah Lees, Research Associate to the Director. Renoir Drawings is organized by the Morgan Library & Museum and the Musée d’Orsay. 

The exhibition at the Musée d’Orsay is organized by Paul Perrin, Director of Curatorial Affairs and Collections, and Anne Distel, Honorary General Curator of Heritage, with the participation of Cloé Viala, Archival Research Assistant.

 Catalogue 

The exhibition is accompanied by an eponymous catalogue, the first of its kind dedicated to Renoir’s graphic oeuvre. It aims to address a critical lacuna in the scholarship on Renoir by launching a survey of his works on paper as a whole, comparable to those dedicated to his fellow Impressionists. It is edited by Colin B. Bailey, Katharine J. Rayner Director, Morgan Library & Museum; Anne Distel, Honorary General Curator of Heritage, Musée d’Orsay, Paris; Sarah Lees, Research Associate to the Director, Morgan Library & Museum; and Paul Perrin, Director of Curatorial Affairs and Collections, Musée d’Orsay, Paris. 

Edited with text by Colin B. Bailey, Anne Distel, Sarah Lees, Paul Perrin. Foreword by Sylvain Amic, Colin B. Bailey. Text by Paul-Louis Durand-Ruel, Flavie Durand-Ruel.

Drawings, pastels, prints and watercolors: Renoir's works on paper provide crucial insight into his instantly recognizable Impressionist paintings

The paintings of Pierre-Auguste Renoir have become icons of Impressionism. Although his works on paper are less widely known, drawing remained central to his artistic practice even as his interests and ambitions changed over the course of a long career. This book explores the ways in which Renoir used paper to test ideas, plan compositions and interpret both landscape and the human figure.
Renoir Drawings features more than 110 drawings, pastels, watercolors, prints and a small selection of paintings, enabling readers to engage with Renoir's creative process while offering insights into his artistic methods over five decades.
Thematic sections cover the full span of the artist's career, ranging from academic studies he made as a student, to on-the-spot impressions of contemporary urban and rural life, to finished, formal portraits, to intimate sketches of friends and family completed late in life. In-depth case studies of favored themes and preparatory work for landmark canvases further illuminate Renoir's drawing practice.
Together with Claude Monet, Edgar Degas and Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) was a founder of the style that became known as Impressionism, and one of its most prolific exponents. He was described by Herbert Read as "the final representative of a tradition which runs directly from Rubens to Watteau."

This book was published in conjunction with RMN-Grand Palais; Musée d'Orsay; Morgan Library & Museum.Published by DelMonico Books in conjunction with RMN-Grand Palais, Musée d’Orsay, and the Morgan Library & Museum, the book will be available in October 2025

Study of the Borghese Mars, ca. 1862–63 Chalk on paper Private collection, Paris

Boating Couple, 1880–81
Pastel on paper
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Given in memory of Governor Alvan T. Fuller by the Fuller Foundation, 61.393
Photograph © 2025 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Young Woman with a Muff, ca. 1880
Red, black, and white chalk on paper
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. H. O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929, 29.100.195

The Descent from the Summit: Jean Martin Steadies Hélène, the Banker’ s Daughter (Illustration for Edmond Renoir’ s “L’Étiquette”), 1883 Black chalk on paper The Art Institute of Chicago, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. B. E. Bensinger, 1969.870R. The Art Institute of Chicago / Art Resource, NY

Motherhood, 1885
Red and white chalk on paper mounted to canvas
Colección Pérez Simón, Mexico Photography © Arturo Piera

The Lovers, ca. 1885
Red and white chalk on paper mounted to canvas
Collection of Hélène Bailly, Paris

Madeleine Adam, 1887
Pastel and graphite on paper Collection of Diane B. Wilsey

Child with a Cat or Julie Manet, 1887 Oil on canvas
Musée d’Orsay, Paris, RF 1999 13 Musée d'Orsay, dist. GrandPalaisRmn. Photography by Patrice Schmidt

Dancers (Bougival) or Dance in the Country, 1883
Oil on canvas
Musée d’Orsay, Paris, RF 1979-64 Musée d'Orsay, dist. GrandPalaisRmn. Photography by Patrice Schmidt

.

Study for “Dance in the Country,” 1883 Brush and brown, blue, and black wash over black chalk or graphite on paper
Yale University Art Gallery,
Bequest of Edith Malvina K. Wetmore, 1966.80.25.

Dance in the Country, 1883
Pen and brush and gray ink on paper
National Gallery of Art, Washington, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1995, 1995.47.65

The Great Bathers, 1886–87
Oil on canvas
Philadelphia Museum of Art. The Mr. and Mrs. Carroll S. Tyson, Jr., Collection, 1963, 1963- 116-13

Study for “The Great Bathers,” ca. 1886–87 Red and white chalk, with smudging and blending, on paper mounted to canvas
The Morgan Library & Museum, Bequest of Drue Heinz, 2018.71. Photography by Graham Haber, 2018.

Splashing Figure (Study for “The Great Bathers”), ca. 1886–87
Red, white, and black chalk, with stumping, and black Conté crayon on tracing paper mounted to canvas
The Art Institute of Chicago, Bequest of Kate L. Brewster, 1949.514
The Art Institute of Chicago / Art Resource, NY.

Sheet of Studies, ca. 1885–86
Graphite, pen and black ink, and watercolor on paper
Musée d’Orsay, Paris, RF 28657
Musée d'Orsay, dist. GrandPalaisRmn. Photography by Tony Querrec

View of a Park, ca. 1885–90
Watercolor with white opaque watercolor on paper
Thaw Collection, The Morgan Library & Museum. Photography by Graham S. Haber, 2017.

Landscape, Autumnal Effect, ca. 1885–86 Watercolor
Inscribed lower right: a Madame Clapisson Collection of David Lachenmann

Trees at the Edge of a Lake, ca. 1890–95 Watercolor on paper
Promised Gift to the Morgan Library & Museum from the Collection of Elizabeth and Jean-Marie Eveillard. Photography courtesy of The Morgan Library & Museum, Photography by Janny Chiu, 2023.

Pinning the Hat, 1890
Pastel on paper, mounted to laminated cardboard The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Gift of Henry W. and Marion H. Bloch, 2015.13.20
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Gift of Henry W. and Marion H. Bloch, 2015.13.20 Image courtesy of Nelson-Atkins Digital Production & Preservation, Joshua Ferdinand.

Gabrielle and Jean, ca. 1895–96
Oil on canvas Musée de l’Orangerie, Paris, Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume Collection, RF 1960-18 Musée de l'Orangerie, dist. GrandPalaisRmn. Photography by Sophie Crépy

Gabrielle and Jean, ca. 1895
Black chalk on paper
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, gift of Martin Fabiani, 1956; 7296. Photo NGC

Child with an Apple or Gabrielle, Jean, and a Young Girl with an Apple, ca. 1895
Pastel
Collection of Leone Cettolin Dauberville Photo © Jean-Louis Losi, Paris

Auguste Rodin, 1914
Red and white chalk
Private collection, United Kingdom, courtesy Daniel Katz Gallery, London Photography by Prudence Cuming Associates, London.

Seated Woman Leaning on Her Elbow, ca. 1915–17
Black chalk
The Albertina Museum, Vienna; inv. 24330. Image: The ALBERTINA Museum, Vienna.

Seated Nude, ca. 1880
Oil on canvas
Musée Rodin, Paris; P.07334
© Musée Rodin, photo Hervé Lewandowski

Seated Nude Seen from the Back, ca. 1885– 87
Red and white chalk on paper mounted to board Collection of George Condo

Crouching Nude, ca. 1897
Red chalk
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; 5827. Photo NGC

Study for “The Judgment of Paris,” ca. 1908 Black, red, and white chalk
The Phillips Collection, Washington, DC; 1636, Acquired 1940.

Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) and Richard Guino (1890–1973)
The Judgment of Paris, 1914
Patinated plaster Musée d’Orsay, Paris; RF 2745 Musée d'Orsay, dist. GrandPalaisRmn. Photography by René-Gabriel Ojéda

'Renoir and Love

Musée d’Orsay, Paris 

17 March – 19 July 2026

 the National Gallery, London 

3 October 2026 – 31 January 2027

 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 

20 February – 13 June 2027

With over 50 works 'Renoir and Love'  will be the most significant exhibition of the French impressionist’s work in the UK for 20 years.

The first exhibition devoted to the artist at the National Gallery since 2007 'Renoir and Love' will include his most experimental, ambitious and admired canvases including the iconic 'Bal au Moulin de la Galette' (1876, the Musée d’Orsay, Paris), which will be exhibited in the UK for the first time.

Organised in partnership with the Musée d’Orsay, Paris, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 'Renoir and Love' will focus on the crucial years of the artist’s career, from the mid-1860s to the mid-1880s. 

The exhibition traces the evolution of the imagery of affection, seduction, conversation, male camaraderie and the sociability of the café and theatre, as well as merry-making, flirtation, courtship and child-rearing in Renoir’s art. 

Loans from private collections and museums worldwide include pictures from Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen; the Städel Museum, Frankfurt; the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm; the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; the Norton Simon Art Foundation, Pasadena, California; and the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC.

Exhibition co-curator Christopher Riopelle, the Neil Westreich Curator of Post-1800 Paintings at the National Gallery, says: 'More than any of his contemporaries, Renoir was committed to chronicling love and friendship and their informal manifestations as keys to modern life. Whether on Parisian streetcorners or in sun-dappled woodlands, he understood that emotion could be as fleeting, as evanescent, as blinding, as his other great and transitory subject, sunlight itself.’

Such themes are explored in tender and personal works to beguiling multi-figure compositions of urban and suburban sociability. Several full-length figure compositions, such as 'The Umbrellas' (1881, reworked 1885, National Gallery), show how Renoir develops the theme into paintings 'worthy of the museum.' His Dance compositions remain universally loved symbols of the French fin-de-siècle. In the early 1880s Renoir moved away from Impressionist style with its fascination with the play of light to more solid, sculptural compositions, but the theme of friendship and joy in nature remains.

The exhibition was initiated by the Musée d’Orsay, Paris, and is organised by the Musée d’Orsay, the National Gallery and the Museum of Fine Arts, BostonThe curators are:

Paris

Paul Perrin, Chief Curator and Director of Conservation and Collections at the Musée d’Orsay, Paris; with the participation of Lucie Lachenal-Tabellet, Archival Research Assistant at the Musée d’Orsay

London

Christopher Riopelle, Neil Westreich Curator of Post-1800 Paintings, National Gallery, London, and Chiara Di Stefano, Associate Curator of Post-1800 Paintings at the National Gallery, London

Boston

Katie Hanson, William and Ann Elfers Curator of Paintings, Art of Europe, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; with the participation of Julia Welch, Arthur K. Solomon Assistant Curator of Paintings, Art of Europe, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 

IMAGES

 Pierre-Auguste Renoir

Dance at the Moulin de la Galette, 1876

Oil on canvas, 131.5 cm x 176.5 cm.

Gustave Caillebotte Bequest, 1896

© Musée d'Orsay, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Patrice Schmidt

Pierre-Auguste Renoir

The Promenade, 1870

J. Paul Getty Museum (Los Angeles)

Oil on canvas

81.3 × 64.8 cm

© J. Paul Getty Museum (Los Angeles)

Pierre-Auguste Renoir

La Conversation, 1878

oil on canvas

45 × 38 cm

Nationalmuseum (Stockholm)

© Nationalmuseum (Stockholm)

“Untitled” (America)

The Whitney Museum of American Art 

Beginning July 5, 2025

The Whitney Museum of American Art presents a refreshed look at the Museum’s collection in the exhibition “Untitled” (America). Coinciding with the Whitney’s ten-year anniversary in its current building downtown, this reinstallation celebrates highlights of the collection alongside new acquisitions in an open, dynamic exhibition design that forges connections across subjects and decades. 

Reflecting on the vision of its founder, sculptor, and philanthropist Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, the presentation underscores the Museum’s longtime commitment to supporting contemporary American art, even as the notion of “America” has and continues to evolve. Today, the Whitney’s collection is a testament to the ambitious and experimental practices of artists in the United States, offering diverse stories of American life through formal, social, and political lenses. “Untitled” (America) features recognizable favorites by renowned American artists, including Jean-Michel Basquiat, Barkley L. Hendricks, Edward Hopper, Jasper Johns, Archibald John Motley Jr., Georgia O’Keeffe, Mark Rothko, Ed Ruscha, Alma Thomas, Kay WalkingStick, and Andy Warhol, alongside more recent acquisitions from the Museum’s collection. It highlights key ideas and artistic approaches in American art from 1900 through the early 1980s, at times cutting across chronological boundaries. 

Beginning with the Whitney’s robust holdings in figurative and realist traditions, the presentation considers how artists have responded to place and memory in the American landscape, popular culture and the rise of consumerism, the seductions and illusions of mass media, and the spatial and cultural dynamics of abstraction. “

We’re thrilled to welcome visitors back to our collection galleries,” said Kim Conaty, Nancy and Steve Crown Family Chief Curator at the Whitney Museum. “The newly configured spaces offer something for everyone, with favorite works in new conversations, and recent additions to the collection making stunning debuts. Special installations, like a daylit sculpture gallery dedicated to the work of Isamu Noguchi, celebrate the great strengths of the collection set within the unique architecture of the Whitney’s downtown building.” 

“Untitled” (America) will be on view at the Whitney Museum beginning July 5, 2025. The exhibition is curated by Kim Conaty, Nancy and Steve Crown Family Chief Curator at the Whitney, with Antonia Pocock, Curatorial Assistant. This presentation of the Whitney’s collection is dedicated to the memory of Leonard A. Lauder, Chairman Emeritus, who recently passed away, in honor of his extensive contributions to the Museum.

Exhibition Overview

“Untitled” (America) On the occasion of the Whitney’s tenth anniversary downtown, “Untitled” (America) celebrates the past, present, and future of the Museum’s collection. This presentation, which features works from 1900 through 1980, highlights beloved icons from the Whitney’s collection, including recent acquisitions that expand existing narratives and surface new ones. Organized thematically, the exhibition foregrounds key ideas and approaches in twentieth-century artmaking in the United States, and the open exhibition design allows for meaningful connections to be made across subjects and time periods. The exhibition title draws inspiration from Felix Gonzalez-Torres, whose 1994 work of the same name will be installed in the west window, just off the entrance to the exhibition. This work, consisting of twelve strands of light bulbs, one of which will be installed here, offers a participatory meditation on the concept of “America.” 

As Gonzalez-Torres reflected, “The America that I now know is still a place of light, a place of opportunities, of risks, of justice, of racism, of injustice, of hunger and excess, of pleasure and growth. Democracy is a constant job, a collective dedication. My sculpture “Untitled” (America) comes with no instructions. It can be installed any way someone might want.” 

In that spirit, this exhibition embraces the complexity and contradictions of “American” art, leaving its definition open to question and collaboration from visitors. “Untitled” (America) opens with five iconic works from the collection: Jasper Johns, Three Flags (1958), Georgia O'Keeffe, Summer Days (1936), Barkley L. Hendricks, Steve (1976), Alma Thomas, Mars Dust (1972), and Kay WalkingStick, April Contemplating May (1972). 

The first gallery is dedicated to the Whitney’s rich history of collecting works by artists working in figural and realist traditions. It highlights several works from the Museum’s founding collection, including Robert Henri, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1916), George Bellows, Dempsey and Firpo (1924), and Edward Hopper, Early Sunday Morning (1930). Reflecting on the Museum’s continued commitment to realism and portraiture, Arshile Gorky’s The Artist and His Mother (1936) will be paired with Alice Neel’s Andy Warhol (1970), both on view at the Museum for the first time in several years.

The American landscape will be examined through conceptions of place, memory, and war, with a selection of works from Jacob Lawrence’s War Series (1946-47), paired with a new acquisition by Fritz Scholder, Massacre at Wounded Knee II (1970). Works by Elsie Driggs, Eldzier Cortor, Joseph Stella, and a new acquisition by Aaron Douglas will examine the built landscape across different moments in US history. Subsequent galleries in the exhibition explore how artists have engaged with objects from everyday life, both as materials and sources of inspiration. 

Works like Yayoi Kusama’s Air Mail Stickers (1969) explore an artist’s transformation of the mundane to the extraordinary, and Marisol’s print Diptych (1971) introduces an irreverent take on self-portraiture through the use of her own body as a matrix. Works by Gerald Murphy and Man Ray offer earlier examples of artists questioning consumerism and bringing popular culture into their work. 

The seductions and illusions of mass media are explored in works like Nam June Paik’s Magnet TV (1965), which undermines the power of broadcast and mass media by distorting and manipulating the content being served to the viewers. Ed Ruscha’s Large Trademark with Eight Spotlights (1962), Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Hollywood Africans (1983), Andy Warhol’s Ethel Scull 36 Times (1963), and Rosalyn Drexler’s Marilyn Pursued by Death (1963) point to the artifice of Hollywood and celebrity culture while engaging in the visual languages of commercial culture. The final gallery of the exhibition explores abstraction through key Abstract Expressionist works, including Clyfford Still’s Untitled (1956), Norman Lewis' American Totem (1960), and Mark Rothko’s Four Darks in Red (1958). Alongside these paintings, Jay DeFeo’s The Rose (1958-66), Lee Bontecou’s Untitled (1963), and a recent acquisition, Zilia Sánchez’s Eros (1976/1998), push further at the spatial and material dynamics of abstraction.

Aaron Douglas, Mural Study for Cravath Hall, Fisk University, 1929. Gouache on board, 17 1/2 × 35 3/8 in. (44.5 × 89.9 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from the DeMartini Family Endowment, the Ganzi Family Endowment, the Meg and Bennett Goodman Family Foundation, and the Poses Family Endowment 2023.17. © 2025 Estate of Aaron Douglas / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

IMAGES

 Edward Hopper, Early Sunday Morning, 1930. Oil on canvas, 35 3/16 × 60 1/4 in. (89.4 × 153 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney 31.426. © 2025 Heirs of Josephine N. Hopper/Licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York 

George Bellows, Dempsey and Firpo, 1924. Oil on canvas, 51 1/8 × 63 1/4 in. (129.9 × 160.7 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney 31.95; 

Archibald John Motley, Jr., Gettin' Religion, 1948. Oil on linen, 32 × 39 7/16 in. (81.3 × 100.2 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase Josephine N. Hopper Bequest, by exchange 2016.15. © Valerie Gerrard Browne 

Robert Henri, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, 1916. Oil on canvas, 49 15/16 × 72in. (126.8 × 182.9 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of Flora Whitney Miller 86.70.3

Joseph Stella, The Brooklyn Bridge: Variation on an Old Theme, 1939. Oil on canvas, 70 1/4 × 42 3/16 in. (178.4 × 107.2 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Purchase 42.15; 

Norman Lewis, American Totem, 1960. Oil on canvas, 73 11/16 × 43 1/8 in. (187.2 × 109.5 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund in memory of Preston Robert and Joan Tisch, the Painting and Sculpture Committee, Director’s Discretionary Fund, Adolph Gottlieb, by exchange, and Sami and Hala Mnaymneh 2018.141. © Norman Lewis, courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC

Gerald Murphy, Cocktail, 1927. Oil and pencil on linen, 29 1/16 × 29 15/16 in. (73.8 × 76 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from Evelyn and Leonard A. Lauder, Thomas H. Lee and the Modern Painting and Sculpture Committee 95.188. © 2025 Estate of Honoria Murphy Donnelly / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Aaron Douglas, Mural Study for Cravath Hall, Fisk University, 1929. Gouache on board, 17 1/2 × 35 3/8 in. (44.5 × 89.9 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from the DeMartini Family Endowment, the Ganzi Family Endowment, the Meg and Bennett Goodman Family Foundation, and the Poses Family Endowment 2023.17. © 2025 Estate of Aaron Douglas / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Jacob Lawrence, War Series: Beachhead, 1947. Tempera on composition board, 15 7/8 × 20 1/16 in. (40.3 × 51 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of Mr. and Mrs. Roy R. Neuberger 51.13. © 2025 The Jacob and Gwendolyn Lawrence Foundation, Seattle / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Jacob Lawrence, War Series: On Leave, 1947. Tempera on composition board, 16 3/16 × 20 1/4 in. (41.1 × 51.4 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of Mr. and Mrs. Roy R. Neuberger 51.12a-b. © 2025 The Jacob and Gwendolyn Lawrence Foundation, Seattle / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Jacob Lawrence, War Series: Purple Hearts, 1947—Press Assets

Mary Bauermeister, Homage to Marbert Du Breer, 1964—Press Assets

Jacob Lawrence, War Series: Docking - Cigarette, Joe?, 1947—Press Assets

Isamu Noguchi, Endless Coupling, 1957—Press Assets

Isamu Noguchi, The Gunas, 1946—Press Assets

Gerald Murphy, Cocktail, 1927—Press Assets

Margaret Bourke-White, Edison Electric, 1930—Press Assets

Rosalyn Drexler, Marilyn Pursued by Death, 1963—Press Assets


Arshile Gorky, The Artist and His Mother, 1926-c. 1936. Oil on canvas, 60 × 50 1/4 in. (152.4 × 127.6 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of Julien Levy for Maro and Natasha Gorky in memory of their father 50.17. © 2025 The Arshile Gorky Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Jacob Lawrence, War Series: Victory, 1947—Press Assets