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    This October, a Global Public Art Project Turns 35 Cities into Playgrounds

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    Nomad Studio, “Socarrado (Scorched)” (2025), Parque Natural Sabinares del Arlanza – La Yecla, Castilla y Leon, Spain

    This October, a Global Public Art Project Turns 35 Cities into Playgrounds

    October 17, 2025

    Art

    Grace Ebert

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    This month, urban centers around the world are hosting a massive public art project helmed by Nōvo Collective. uncommissioned has tapped 54 artists for a global initiative that sees the city as a playground, inviting participants “to slip playful, overlooked, or quietly defiant gestures into the cracks of everyday life.”

    In Stellenbosch, South Africa, Strijdom van der Merwe installed sun-activated text works displaying heady phrases like “the visible is a shadow cast by the invisible.” Escif painted tiny fruits among the architecture near his home in Valencia, while Vhils painted a collection of fragmented portraits atop a Munich cultural center.

    Vhils, “Antennas” (2025), KUNSTLABOR 2, Munich. Image courtesy of Jose Pando Lucas, MUCA

    Perhaps most striking is Nomad Studio’s wooden structure erected in a park in Castilla y León, Spain. Appearing to fan outward in a circle, a collection of branches forms a meditative space with an opening to the sky that lets light stream inside.

    uncommissioned continues throughout October with works by Cannupa Hanska Luger, Jason deCaires Taylor, Stephanie Brown, and many others slated for 35 cities total. See more on the project’s website.

    Nomad Studio, “Socarrado (Scorched)” (2025), Parque Natural Sabinares del Arlanza – La Yecla, Castilla y Leon, Spain

    Nomad Studio, “Socarrado (Scorched)” (2025), Parque Natural Sabinares del Arlanza – La Yecla, Castilla y Leon, Spain

    Strijdom van der Merwe, “Shadow Words” (2025), Stellenbosch, South Africa

    Strijdom van der Merwe, “Shadow Words” (2025), Stellenbosch, South Africa

    Leon Reid IV, “Of a Free Will” (2025), Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. Photo by Leon Reid IV

    Escif, “Infinite Still Life” (2025), Valencia. Photo by Escif

    Escif, “Infinite Still Life” (2025), Valencia. Photo by Escif

    Vhils, “Antennas” (2025), KUNSTLABOR 2, Munich. Image courtesy of Jose Pando Lucas, MUCA

    Vhils, “Antennas” (2025), KUNSTLABOR 2, Munich. Image courtesy of Jose Pando Lucas, MUCA

    Emmanuel Aggrey Tieku, “HOW TO HEAL A B-R-O-K-E-N WORLD-Cemetery of Belongings” (2025), Osu Cemetery, Accra, Ghana

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      Alison Friend Packs a Lot of Personality into Witty Dog Portraits

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      All images courtesy of Artisan, shared with permission

      Alison Friend Packs a Lot of Personality into Witty Dog Portraits

      October 17, 2025

      ArtBooks

      Grace Ebert

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      Dogs, they’re just like us! Perpetually anxious pizza lovers.

      The pups taking center stage in Alison Friend’s beloved paintings sport a range of personalities that feel all too familiar: several hungrily snack on pastries, sip cocktails, and even present their self-portraits on everyone’s favorite toy, the Etch A Sketch.

      Friend is known for her witty pieces that portray our domestic pals in the style of the Old Masters, lending a sense of reverence to her furry subjects. The artist’s first monograph, Dog Only Knows, is available this month from Artisan and collects 125 of her canine works, a small fraction of which are shown here.

      Pre-order your copy in the Colossal Shop, and find more from Friend on Instagram.

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      Ruth Asawa Arrives in New York with a Monumental Retrospective

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      Installation view of ‘Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective.’ Photo by Jonathan Dorado, © 2025 The Museum of Modern Art, New York

      Ruth Asawa Arrives in New York with a Monumental Retrospective

      October 17, 2025

      Art

      Jackie Andres

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      One of the most iconic figures of the mid-20th century, trailblazing Japanese-American artist Ruth Asawa led a prolific life of art-making, advocacy, and civic engagement. Over a decade after her passing, the last year has ushered in a momentous wave of exhibitions for Asawa—appearing at David Zwirner in her first solo exhibition in Greater China, followed by two major showings of Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective.

      In a tale of two MoMAs, the enormous exhibition recently traveled from its point of origin in San Francisco, where the artist fostered a deep, lifelong connection to the city. Its arrival in New York City now marks the largest show dedicated to a woman artist in the museum’s history.

      Photograph by Laurence Cuneo. © 2025 Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc., courtesy of David Zwirner

      Featuring more than 300 of Asawa’s artworks spread across a whopping 16,000 square feet, the expansive collection documents the artist’s six-decade-long career. You can expect to get a close look at her groundbreaking wire sculptures, intimate paintings, drawings, and prints, as well as bronze casts and monumental public works.

      Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective opens at the Museum of Modern Art on October 19, where it will be on view until February 7, 2026. Explore more from Asawa on Colossal, and delve further into her practice through her estate’s website.

      Installation view of ‘Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective.’ Photo by Jonathan Dorado, © 2025 The Museum of Modern Art, New York

      “Poppy” (1965), lithograph, 30 1∕16 × 20 9∕16 inches, edition of 20. Image © 2025 Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc., courtesy of David Zwirner

      “Untitled (S.398, Hanging Eight-Lobed, Four-Part, Discontinuous Surface Form within a Form with Spheres in the Seventh and Eighth Lobes)” (1955), brass wire, iron wire, and galvanized iron wire, 8 feet 8 1/2 inches × 14 1/2 × 14 1/2 inches. Image © 2025 Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc., courtesy of David Zwirner

      “Untitled (BMC.145, BMC Laundry Stamp)” (1948–49), stamped ink on fabric sheeting, 36 3/4 × 45 1/2 inches. Image © 2025 Ruth Asawa Lanier, Inc., courtesy of David Zwirner

      Installation view of ‘Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective.’ Photo by Jonathan Dorado, © 2025 The Museum of Modern Art, New York

      Installation view of ‘Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective.’ Photo by Jonathan Dorado, © 2025 The Museum of Modern Art, New York

      Installation view of ‘Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective.’ Photo by Jonathan Dorado, © 2025 The Museum of Modern Art, New York

      Installation view of ‘Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective.’ Photo by Jonathan Dorado, © 2025 The Museum of Modern Art, New York

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      Conrad Bakker Recreated All 1,100+ Books in Pioneering Land Artist Robert Smithson’s Personal Library

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      Detail of ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ installed at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts, 2014. All images courtesy of Conrad Bakker, shared with permission

      Conrad Bakker Recreated All 1,100+ Books in Pioneering Land Artist Robert Smithson’s Personal Library

      October 16, 2025

      Art

      Grace Ebert

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      An autodidact and polymath, Robert Smithson cemented himself as one of the pre-eminent land artists in his short lifetime. Along with his fellow artist and wife Nancy Holt, Smithson pioneered a new way of working that explored connections to the landscape and place and endlessly probed the formation of knowledge.

      When he died in a plane crash in 1973 at just 35 years old, he left behind a vast personal library that represented his broad interests: there were books on crystals and rock minerals, dinosaurs and insects, myths and children’s rhymes, and classics like James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake and Jorge Luis Borges’ Ficciones. Holt donated the entirety of Smithson’s collection— approximately 1,120 books—to the Archives of American Art after his death, where it’s still housed today.

      ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ member Pep Fernàndez, holding his book in Barcelona, Spain

      There’s also, though, another way to peek into the narratives and materials that shaped Smithson’s thinking and practice. In 2019, Conrad Bakker completed a five-year-long project of recreating every title in that original collection on a 1:1 scale. Presented in museums and galleries from Utah to Arkansas to New York, “Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club” is both a painstaking ode to the pioneering artist and a bold consideration of how we access and consume information.

      “I can’t really remember my first encounter with Robert Smithson, but I’ve always been a fan of his artwork and, in particular, the way he oriented his sculptures to coexist inside the physical space of a gallery and outside in the landscape,” Bakker says. He first encountered the artist’s library through Ann Reynolds’ Robert Smithson: Learning from New Jersey and Elsewhere, which provided a comprehensive catalog of each title and edition in the collection.

      “I was captivated by this wonderful list of books and curious about the diversity of his research subjects, the intensity of his self-education through books,” Bakker says, adding that the library also serves as a “time capsule of artistic research of the 1960s. I imagined this collection of books as an extension of Robert Smithson’s mind, his curiosity, and thinking.”

      This prompted one component of Bakker’s ongoing Untitled Projects, a practice of recreating everyday objects like chocolate bars or VHS tapes to explore facets of economic systems, production, and consumption. Using images from online booksellers, he carved and painted wooden replicas of each edition.

      Detail of ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ installed in the exhibition ‘Extra Taste at International Objects,’ NYC, 2024

      Displayed in cardboard-like boxes and stacked on the floor, Bakker’s collection has taken many forms, from room-sized installations to a full-scale bookstore in the storefront of the Famous Hardware building in Springdale, Arkansas. While the library remains intact in his studio, the “Book Club” also allowed collectors to purchase a second sculpture for a time. He created about 350 additional works for this element of the project.

      The library is just one part of Bakker’s interest in books as objects, which includes a used paperback sale and an archive of self-help titles from the 1970s. For the artist, these objects offer numerous lines of inquiry from “books as historical records of culture and personal memories, books ascommodities, bookstores as public spaces, books as (outdated) technology, and books as portable containers of information, instructions, and ideas,” he writes.

      Bakker is currently working on several projects, including a full-scale copy shop (think 1980s-era Kinko’s) for The Weather Station in Lafayette, Indiana. In early 2026, he’ll also show a piece connecting capitalism and climate change at the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art. The library is likely headed to Stockholm in the coming months, but keep an eye on the project’s Instagram for more.

      You might also enjoy Bernie Kaminski’s papier-mâché objects and Matt Stevens’ Good Movies as Old Books.

      Detail of ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ installed in the exhibition ‘Extra Taste at International Objects,’ NYC, 2024

      Installation view of ‘Untitled Project: Smithson’s Books’ installed in the storefront windows of the Famous Hardware building in Springdale, Arkansas, 2021

      ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ member Ruth Lopez holding her book

      Detail of ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ installed at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts, 2014

      Detail of ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ installed in the exhibition ‘Extra Taste at International Objects,’ NYC, 2024

      Installation view of ‘Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club’ installed in the exhibition ‘Extra Taste at International Objects,’ NYC, 2024

      Conrad Bakker inside ‘R. Smithson Books.’ Photo by Meredith Mashburn Photography

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      Dive into the Painstaking Process of Restoring an 18th-Century Fan

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      All images courtesy of the V&A

      Dive into the Painstaking Process of Restoring an 18th-Century Fan

      October 16, 2025

      ArtDesignHistory

      Grace Ebert

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      Armed with tweezers, a porcupine quill, and more patience than most of us could fathom, the senior paper conservator of the Victoria & Albert Museum tackles a finicky restoration project in a new video. Susan Catcher walks us through her impeccably precise process as she restores a damaged fan dating back 200 years. She shares insights into her techniques and materials, all of which have to be reversible should the project need to be redone.

      This video is one of many within the V&A’s series on conservation, which includes restoring Shakespearean costumes, a portrait of Marie Antoinette, and a Samurai figure. Watch more on YouTube.

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      Stan Squirewell’s Mixed-Media Collages Imbue Anonymous Historical Photos with Panache

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      “She Saw Far and Wide” (2023), mixed media, photo collage, acrylic paint, and glitter mounted on canvas in a hand-carved frame, 90 x 76 inches. All images courtesy of the artist, Claire Oliver Gallery, and Plattsburgh State Art Museum, shared with permission

      Stan Squirewell’s Mixed-Media Collages Imbue Anonymous Historical Photos with Panache

      October 16, 2025

      ArtPhotography

      Kate Mothes

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      Nothing sparks the imagination quite like coming across a trove of old photographs. We look for writing on the reverse and scan the anonymous faces to read a range of expressions. Where exactly they were at that moment, what brought them together that day, and who took the picture? For Stan Squirewell, the allure of historical portraits is a central tenet of his multimedia practice.

      In large-scale, mixed-media collages, the artist begins with black-and-white photographs, typically taken a century ago or longer. He especially emphasizes portraits of Black individuals, whether gathered together as a group or posing independently. Some of these compositions start with a formal portrait in a studio, while others have more of a snapshot quality. On their clothing, Squirewell collages fabric patterns, paint, and glitter, inviting the past into the present.

      “Awinita” (2022), mixed-media collage, paint, and hand-carved shou sugi ban frame, 59 x 45 inches

      Squirewell’s current solo exhibition, Robitussin, Hotcombs & Grease at Plattsburgh State Art Museum, delves into Black identity and daily experience. The title nods to ubiquitous items as “hallmarks of domesticity and comfort in Black homes,” the museum says, focusing on “the reclamation of identity from historical anonymity.”

      Squirewell sources photographs from the Smithsonian Institution’s anonymous photo collections and from family and friends. Through the intimate medium of the portrait, anonymous individuals emerge from the archives and are imbued with vivacious textile patterns, and recognizable luxury brands like Louis Vuitton and Gucci suggest elevated style and status. Scale also plays a role, too, as Squirewell prints the photos quite large, blurring features in the process yet representing the figures closer to life-size so that their presence is palpable.

      Robitussin, Hotcombs & Grease continues through December 5. Plan your visit on the museum’s website, and find more of the artist’s work on Instagram.

      “Uncle O,” cut photograph collage mounted on canvas, oil, and glitter in hand-carved shou sugi ban frame, 62.5 x 32.5 inches

      “Colorful Joseph II” (2024), cut and collaged archival photography, glitter, and paint, 15.5 x 12.5 inches

      “Chico & Charles 3” (2025), manipulated photo-collage, 42 x 26 inches

      “Almaz & Lil Symphony”, mixed media collage, paint, and hand-carved shou sugi ban frame, 57 x 40 inches

      “Dai Dai” (2022), mixed-media collage, paint, and hand-carved shou sugi van frame, 47 x 39 inches

      “Benny & Al,” mixed media, photo collage, acrylic paint, and glitter in a hand-carved frame, 88 x 58 inches

      “He’s Home” (2024), artist-printed photos collaged with paint and glitter in a hand-carved shou sugi ban frame, 20 x 12 inches

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      The First Monograph to Survey Derrick Adams’ Career Comes Ahead of a Major Exhibition

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      “Floater 93” (2020), acrylic and fabric collage on paper, overall 100 x 50 inches. Photos by John Bergens. All images courtesy of Derrick Adams and Monacelli, shared with permission

      The First Monograph to Survey Derrick Adams’ Career Comes Ahead of a Major Exhibition

      October 15, 2025

      ArtBooks

      Kate Mothes

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      Whether portraying families at play, people walking along urban streets, or portraits of individuals, Derrick Adams celebrates Black identity and experience. His collage-like compositions evoke West African masks, reliquary figures, and other carved sculptures, highlighting contemporary, everyday scenes and leisure activities of Black Americans.

      A new monograph from Monacelli surveys more than two decades of Adams’ geometric paintings, made in his signature multihued, faceted style. Derrick Adams is the first monograph to survey the artist’s entire career, tracing his stylistic evolution and the themes that recur throughout his paintings. His paintings capture “moments of joy, resilience, and celebration,” says a statement from the publisher.

      “Figure in the Urban Landscape 15” (2018), acrylic, graphite, ink, fabric collage, grip tape,
      and model cars on wood panel, 48 x 48 x 3 inches

      Organized into three sections—Channeling, Signaling, and Mirroring—the book highlights the artist’s explorations of representation, identity, and the media. We also trace the evolution of his visual language, which he describes as “seriocomic imagery,” along with his “desire to see Black American experiences mirrored in art, in part rectifying the dearth of such imagery in art history,” the publisher says. “At its core, Adams’s project is a reinvigoration of the Black figure in art, an intention seen throughout the works in the book.”

      The release of Derrick Adams sets the stage for a mid-career survey of the artist’s work at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston. Titled View Finder, the show opens on April 16 and will present 150 works.

      Derrick Adams is slated for release on October 22. Pre-order your copy from the Colossal Shop, and explore more on Adams’ website and Instagram.

      “Black Mirror” (2023), acrylic and fabric collage on wood panel, 30 x 30 inches

      “Only Happy Thoughts” (2024), acrylic and fabric collage on wood panel, 60 x 60 inches

      “Onward and Upward” (2021), acrylic on wood panel, 72 x 192 ⅛ inches

      “Pot Head 3” (2025), acrylic on wood panel, 28 x 14 inches

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      Tiny Art Show Repurposes a Disused Stairwell into a 1:6-Scale Gallery

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      All images courtesy of Tiny Art Show, shared with permission

      Tiny Art Show Repurposes a Disused Stairwell into a 1:6-Scale Gallery

      October 14, 2025

      ArtDesign

      Kate Mothes

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      In 2016, while artist McKay Lenker Bayer was still an undergraduate, her professor assigned the class the task of exhibiting their work. Unsure about presenting her work to the public, she downsized, quite literally, showing miniature paintings with teensy-tiny labels. And the idea for a minuscule exhibition space was born.

      In 2018, Lenker Bayer established Tiny Art Show, a community art project that utilizes unique and unexpected spaces around Provo, Utah, to show original work by numerous artists. Until this year, the project was largely nomadic, but Tiny Art Show now has its own dedicated space.

      Installed at 1:6 scale, the storefront-style gallery sits inside what was originally a stairwell, accessible from street level. Its blue facade is reminiscent of retail spaces in New York City or London, and inside, it’s what Leker Bayer describes as “a fully functional, commercial art gallery… that just happens to be tiny.” Original work is for sale, opening events draw gatherings of people who enjoy tiny snacks, and you can even grab a tiny newspaper from the vending machine near the door.

      In addition to its miniature brick-and-mortar presentations, Tiny Art Show also facilitates a series of art projects like the Monthly Mini Mail Club, a subscription that dispatches an itty-bitty periodical called The Tiny Times, plus a booklet from that month’s gallery show. You can also purchase tiny art kits in the shop, along with prints and merchandise.

      Explore more on the project’s website, and keep an eye on Instagram for updates about forthcoming shows.

      Work by Brian Kershisnik

      Work by Merrilee Liddiard

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      Sinister Skies Set the Scene for Derelict Buildings in Lee Madgwick’s Surreal Paintings

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      “Fracture.” All images courtesy of Lee Madgwick, shared with permission

      Sinister Skies Set the Scene for Derelict Buildings in Lee Madgwick’s Surreal Paintings

      October 14, 2025

      Art

      Kate Mothes

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      Beneath ominous skies and set within flat, green parkland, Lee Madgwick’s folly-like buildings strike an unsettling note. His surreal paintings feature dilapidated facades and uncanny shrubbery against cloudy, deep gray skies—usually with something just a little strange going on.

      In “Drift,” for example, bricks dislodge from the top of a boxy structure and float into the sky one by one, and “Fracture” defies gravity altogether with a hovering apartment tower that crumbles from below. Madgwick’s rural scenes nod to landscapes and developments that are often overlooked, imbuing them with what he describes as “an undercurrent of mischievous menace.”

      “Echoes”

      Madgwick’s paintings aren’t without hints of dark humor, like in “Echoes,” in which half a building appears to be missing, as if washed away in a now-calm stream. Inside the ragged remains, a waterslide makes use of the height.

      People are nowhere to be seen in Madgwick’s compositions, although their presence is felt in the graffiti left on walls or curtains drawn in various windows. His latest body of work continues “to portray that mysterious and melancholic otherworldliness of seemingly long abandoned and isolated buildings under heavy skies,” he tells Colossal.

      The artist’s work will be on view at Brian Sinfield Gallery in Burford, Oxfordshire, from October 18 to November 4. Find more on Madgwick’s website and Instagram.

      “Badlands”

      “Drift”

      “Boom!”

      “Empire”

      “Evanescence”

      “Hope”

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