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    ‘Spirit Worlds’ Illuminates Our Timeless Quest to Comprehend the Supernatural

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    Agnes Pelton, “Fountains” (1926), oil on canvas. Photo courtesy of Peter Palladino/The Agnes Pelton Society. All images courtesy of TASCHEN, shared with permission

    ‘Spirit Worlds’ Illuminates Our Timeless Quest to Comprehend the Supernatural

    August 13, 2025

    ArtBooksHistoryPhotography

    Kate Mothes

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    Since time immemorial, humans have been both awed and guided by the power of the unknown. A basis of spiritual beliefs the world over is the abiding question, why?—a probing wonderment often followed closely by, what happens when we die?

    Human belief systems provide structure that help us to make sense of the world, and yet the nature of our existence—and how we fit into the context of the cosmos—comprises some of the most beguiling mysteries of all. It’s no surprise that across cultures and throughout millennia, our search for meaning and connection with other worlds has inspired incredible creativity.

    Adolf de Meyer, “Fortune Teller” (1921)

    Spirit Worlds, forthcoming from TASCHEN on September 15, celebrates art’s relationship to other realms. More than 400 works spanning thousands of years, paired with essays and interviews with scholars and practitioners, illustrate our fascination with supernatural, from angels and celestial beings to darker forces like ghosts and demons.

    The title marks the sixth installment in The Library of Esoterica series, which also includes titles like Plant Magick and Sacred Sites. Spirit Worlds clocks in at more than 500 pages, surveying death rites, altars, sacred temples, the messages of prophets, links mediums make with the other side, symbolic statuary, and more.

    “In this expansive volume, we board the ferry across the storied river and enter the gloomy passages between lands, stepping across the threshold—to part the most sacred of veils,” the publisher says.

    Pre-order your copy in the Colossal Shop.

    Mariusz Lewandowski “Soul Hunter” (2015), 40 x 50 centimeters

    The Jade Emperor or King of Heaven at Chua On Lang taoist temple, Ho chi Minh City, Vietnam

    “Paradiso, Canto 12: The rings of glorified souls in the sun,” illustration from ‘The Divine Comedy’ by Dante Alighieri, 1885. Digitally colored engraving originally by Gustave Doré

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      An Inflatable Building Recreates the Iconic Mecca Flats at the Heart of Chicago’s Black Renaissance

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      All images courtesy of Floating Museum, shared with permission

      An Inflatable Building Recreates the Iconic Mecca Flats at the Heart of Chicago’s Black Renaissance

      August 12, 2025

      ArtDesignHistory

      Grace Ebert

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      As the World’s Fair loomed on Chicago’s horizon, architects Willoughby J. Edbrooke and Franklin Pierce Burnham built a 98-unit hotel to house visitors. After the exposition was finished, the Romanesque Revival building with a large central courtyard was converted into apartments and became known as Mecca Flats.

      Chicago adhered to strict segregation codes in the 19th century, and Mecca Flats, located in the Bronzeville neighborhood at 3360 S. State Street, wasn’t immune. The complex originally only allowed white residents, before allowing Black residents in 1911. Quickly, the building became a site for creatives well-known in the Black Renaissance. Gwendolyn Brooks famously titled a book after the tenement, and luminaries Muddy Waters and Katherine Dunham called Mecca Flats home.

      View of the indoor atrium at the Mecca Flats, East 34th and South State Street, Chicago, Illinois.

      Although a historical beacon of Black creativity, the Illinois Institute of Technology razed the building in 1952. It was replaced by the Mies van der Rohe-designed S.R. Crown Hall.

      While Mecca Flats are long gone, its memory lives on throughout Chicago, and thanks to the collective known as Floating Museum, a new artwork revives the cultural hub. “for Mecca” is a large-scale inflatable structure recreating the once-thriving complex in grayscale polyester. Scaled down, this iteration stretches 41 feet long, with a U-shaped passageway for viewers to walk through.

      Floating Museum is co-directed by avery r. young, Andrew Schachman, Faheem Majeed, and Jeremiah Hulsebos-Spofford, who share that the project offers a “tangible artifact” of Chicago’s lost history. They say:

      “for Mecca” represents our collective interest in Bronzeville’s complex history. We can no longer view nostalgic images of Mies van der Rohe—enjoying a cigar in the emptiness of S.R. Crown Hall—without also imagining Mecca Flats, collapsed under his feet, and recalling the slow strategic displacement of the African American community signified by the presence of its absence.

      The project also includes several nods to former South Side institutions, including the jazz dancehall Savoy Ballroom and the Regal Theatre, a popular night club and performance venue.

      Debuting this past weekend at the original site, the project will travel around the city’s parks through the summer of 2026. “for Mecca” is the latest project in the collective’s Floating Monuments series, which seeks to uncover critical cultural and historical legacies within Chicago through public installations.

      Find more from Floating Museum on its website.

      The Stroll, Regal Theater, and the Savoy Ballroom, Chicago, 1941. Photo by Russell Lee. Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Black-and-White Negatives.

      Savoy Ballroom, 47th Street and South Parkway, Chicago, 1929. Curt Teich Postcard Archives Digital Collection, Newberry Library.

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      ‘Outcasts’ Highlights the Scientific Contributions of Trailblazing Artist and Naturalist Mary Banning

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      Polyporus beattiei, Banning (late 1800s), watercolor on paper. All images courtesy of New York State Museum, Albany, shared with permission

      ‘Outcasts’ Highlights the Scientific Contributions of Trailblazing Artist and Naturalist Mary Banning

      July 28, 2025

      ArtHistoryIllustrationNatureScience

      Kate Mothes

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      In the 1800s, mycology—the study of fungi—was a relatively new field, emerging around the same time as Enlightenment-era studies in botany and herbal medicine. Science and art converged in works like Elizabeth Blackwell’s A Curious Herbal, along with German naturalist Lorenz Oken’s seven-volume Allgemaine Naturgeschichte, consisting of more than 5,000 pages dedicated to classifying everything from beetles and fish to mushrooms and ferns.

      In the late 19th century in Maryland, Mary Elizabeth Banning (1822–1903) emerged as one of America’s first mycologists—and the first woman to describe a new fungus species to science. The self-taught artist and scientist is now the focus of a nature-centered exhibition at New York State Museum, Outcasts: Mary Banning’s World of Mushrooms. The show features 28 original watercolors and detailed records of various mushroom species from the unpublished manuscript of her book, The Fungi of Maryland. In fact, of the 175 species she documented, 23 of them were unknown to science at the time.

      Fistulina hepatica, Fr. (late 1800s), watercolor on paper

      Banning’s manuscript is dedicated to Charles H. Peck, whose role as New York State Botanist—and an enthusiastic mycologist—at the NYSM formed the foundation of a 30-year correspondence with Banning. As a woman in an almost entirely male field, who also lacked formal biology degrees, Banning was largely ostracized from professional proceedings at the time, but her work did not go unrecognized. Peck published some of her findings in the Annual Report in 1871, and he kept her manuscript in a drawer at NYSM, where it remained for more than nine decades.

      A handful of Banning and Peck’s letters are included in Outcasts, along with some of Peck’s lab equipment, mushroom specimens that Banning collected, and a dozen early 20th-century wax models of fungi from the NYSM Natural History Collection.

      Along with Banning’s vibrant illustrations, the exhibition introduces visitors to the mycological universe, including prehistoric specimens like Prototaxites. A fossilized example of the ancient life form was found in Orange County, New York. Around 420 to 370 million years ago, these unique organisms would have towered over the landscape at up to 26 feet high.

      Outcasts: Mary Banning’s World of Mushrooms continues through January 4 in Albany. Learn more and plan your visit on the museum’s website.

      Lactarius indigo, Schw. (1878), watercolor on paper

      Agaricus Americanus, Peck. (1879), watercolor on paper

      “Interpendencies” feature wall of ‘Outcasts: Mary Banning’s World of Mushrooms’

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      A Multifaceted Book and Exhibition, ‘Black Earth Rising’ Contends with Colonialism, Land, and Climate

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      Precious Okoyoman, “To See The Earth Before the End of the World” (2022). Photo by Clelia Cadamuro, courtesy La Biennale di Venezia. © Precious Okoyomon 2024. All images courtesy of Thames & Hudson, shared with permission

      A Multifaceted Book and Exhibition, ‘Black Earth Rising’ Contends with Colonialism, Land, and Climate

      July 14, 2025

      ArtBooksClimateHistoryNature

      Kate Mothes

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      Between 450 B.C.E. and 950 C.E., a particularly fertile soil known by researchers as terra preta, literally “black earth” in Portuguese, was cultivated by Indigenous farmers in the Amazon Basin. The soil was made with broken pottery, compost, bones, manure, and charcoal—which lends its characteristic dark shade—making it rich in nutrients and minerals.

      The historic, fecund material becomes a symbolic nexus for the exhibition Black Earth Rising, now on view at Baltimore Museum of Art. Curated by journalist and writer Ekow Eshun, the show illuminates several links between the climate crisis, land, presence, colonization, diasporas, and social and environmental justice.

      Raphaël Barontini, “Au Bal des Grands Fonds” (2022), acrylic, ink, glitter, and silkscreen on canvas 70 7/8 x 118 1/8 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Mariane Ibrahim, Chicago, Paris, and Mexico City

      Accompanying the exhibition is a new anthology published by Thames & Hudson titled Black Earth Rising: Colonialism and Climate Change in Contemporary Art, which highlights works by more than 150 African diasporic, Latin American, and Native American contemporary artists.

      The volume explores intersections between slavery and forced migration, the environmental consequences of colonialism, socio-political injustices experienced by urban Black and Brown communities, and the violent occupation of Native lands—all through the lens of learning from Indigenous knowledge systems and a wide range of cultural practices to consider more carefully how we view and interact with the natural world.

      Black Earth Rising brings together striking works by some of the art world’s most prominent practitioners, from Cannupa Hanska Luger and Precious Okoyoman to Wangechi Mutu and Firelei Báez, among many others. Hanska Luger’s ongoing project, Future Ancestral Technologies, takes a multimedia approach to science fiction as a vehicle for collective thinking. Luger describes the project as a way to imagine “a post-capitalism, post-colonial future where humans restore their bonds with the earth and each other.”

      Carrie Mae Weems’ photograph “A Distant View,” from The Louisiana Project, approaches the history of enslaved women in the South through the perspective of a muse—the artist herself—spectrally inhabiting a seemingly idyllic landscape. Reflecting on the relaxed atmosphere of the image, we’re confronted with the stark reality experienced by Black people who were forced to labor on plantations, these grand houses now symbolic of atrocious violence and inequities.

      Cannupa Hanska Luger, “We Live, Future Ancestral Technologies Entry Log” (2019). Image courtesy of the artist and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York

      “Black Earth Rising presents a discourse on climate change that places the voices of people of color at the active center rather than on the passive periphery,” says a statement from the publisher.

      Through a wide variety of paintings, photography, sculpture, installation, and interdisciplinary pieces, readers—and visitors to the exhibition—are invited to consider how the continuum of history influences the climate crisis today and how we can proceed toward a future that centers unity and deeper relationships with nature.

      The Black Earth Rising exhibition continues through September 21. Find your copy of the anthology on Bookshop, and plan your visit to the show on the Baltimore Museum of Art’s website.

      Carrie Mae Weems, “A Distant View” from ‘The Louisiana Project’ (2003), gelatin silver print, 20 x 20 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Gladstone Gallery, New York; Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco; and Galerie Barbara Thumm, Berlin. © Carrie Mae Weems

      Akea Brionne, “Home Grown” (2023), digital woven image on jacquard with rhinestones, poly-fil, and thread, 48 x 60 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Lyles & King, New York

      Todd Gray, detail of “Atlantic (Tiepolo)” (2022), four archival pigment prints in artist’s frames and UV laminate, 72 5/8 x 49 1/8 x 5 inches. Image courtesy of Todd Gray and David Lewi More

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      The 16th-Century Artist Who Created the First Compendium of Insect Drawings

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      All images courtesy of the National Gallery of Art

      The 16th-Century Artist Who Created the First Compendium of Insect Drawings

      July 11, 2025

      ArtHistoryIllustrationNature

      Grace Ebert

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      Nearly a century before the invention of the microscope and even longer before entomology became a field of research, Joris Hoefnagel (1542-1600) devoted himself to studying the natural world. The 16th-century polymath created an enormous multi-volume collection called The Four Elements, which contained more than 300 watercolor renderings, each depicted with exceptional detail.

      As Evan Puschak of the YouTube channel Nerdwriter1 (previously) explains, Hoefnagel showed unparalleled talent in his field. Compared to one of his predecessors, Albrecht Dürer, Hoefnagel draws with a painstaking commitment to precision and accuracy, even depicting specimens’ shadows with impeccable fidelity. As Kottke writes, “his paintings were so accurate that if he’d lived 200 years later, you would have called him a naturalist.”

      While drawings in three of the books appear to mimic other scientific renderings of the period, Hoefnagel seems to have created his works by studying the insects themselves and sometimes even included parts of their bodies in his compositions. His Fire volume, full of beetles, butterflies, and other arthropods, is thought to be the first of its kind.

      Some of Hoefnagel’s works are on view at the National Gallery of Art in Little Beasts: Art, Wonder, and the Natural World, which ventures back to the 16th and 17th centuries to explore how artists and naturalists have historically been aligned. It’s also worth looking at the museum’s interactive archive that lets viewers zoom in on several of Hoefnagel’s drawings.

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      Explore Centuries of Art History 15 Minutes at a Time in James Payne’s ‘Great Art Explained’

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      All images courtesy of Great Art Explained

      Explore Centuries of Art History 15 Minutes at a Time in James Payne’s ‘Great Art Explained’

      July 2, 2025

      ArtHistory

      Kate Mothes

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      The art world is rife with persistent myths and associations, some of which are based on socio-economic factors that have prevailed for, well, millennia. For instance, wealthy patrons have historically been among the few who benefit in a system that can be exclusive and elitist. Whether we’re talking rich ancient Romans, the Medici family in Renaissance Florence, myriad kings and queens, or today’s major art collectors, the bottom line is most often money. For many, that’s a solid barrier to entry.

      Another term that gets tossed around a lot is “gatekeeping.” Galleries, art dealers, museum curators, scholars, publishers, and so on assume roles as tastemakers and assessors, building relationships (or not) that often determine which artworks end up in public institutions, which shows receive attention, or which private collections artists’ pieces are destined to join. Gatekeeping is, by definition, the act of monitoring who “gets in,” reinforcing the notion of exclusivity. In short, it describes a multitude of potential barriers.

      So, if the art world has historically always indulged the wealthy or felt like a realm for scholars and intellectuals, how can it be made more accessible? That’s what curator, gallerist, educator, and self-described passionate art lover James Payne is up to with Great Art Explained.

      The video series began in May 2020, at the height of the pandemic, with the simple premise that great art can be “explained clearly and concisely in 15 minutes,” he says. Payne’s YouTube channel chronicles seminal artworks throughout the centuries, predominantly focusing on textbook titans of European and American art like Marcel Duchamp, Sandro Botticelli, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jackson Pollock, Johannes Vermeer, Salvador Dalí, and more.

      Distilling the stories of iconic pieces into 15-minute explanations, Payne dives into some of the most groundbreaking moments in art history. The most recent video highlights a turning point in American art through the lens of Jackson Pollock’s splatter paintings, including “Number 1, 1950 (Lavender Mist),” which the artist painted on the floor of a Long Island barn in 1950.

      Pollock’s methods, lifestyle, and views have long been polarizing, but he is most known for eschewing traditional brushwork—changing the course of art history, really—by pouring, dripping, and flinging paint onto canvas. Not only that, he removed the substrate from the wall and put it on the floor, challenging notions of formality and preciousness. There’s even a discarded cigarette and a few rogue insects permanently stuck to the surface.

      Lee Krasner, “Combat” (1965), oil on canvas, 179 x 410.4 centimeters

      “Number 1, 1950 (Lavender Mist)” and similar works made around that time amounted to an artistic breakthrough for Pollock, who has come to exemplify the myth of the lone, troubled, so-called “cowboy painter.” (He was born in Cody, Wyoming, and was known to drink to excess; he died in 1956 in an alcohol-related car crash.) This period of his practice also spurred the Abstract Expressionist movement in New York City and marked a monumental shift in our appreciation of what painting can be.

      Payne is interested in these kinds of trailblazing moments, but he emphasizes letting go of “art-speak” to bring us closer to significant works of art through a mini-documentary format. He releases a new video each month, plus an occasional sub-series called Great Art Cities that highlights a variety of destinations in collaboration with travel writer Joanne Shurvell.

      “Sometimes the artwork is a springboard for other wider issues I would like to explore, and sometimes, it is a simple exploration of techniques and meaning,” Payne says. “For me, setting the works in context helps us appreciate them more.”

      Payne’s work is supported via Patreon, and a Great Art Explained book is slated for release from Thames & Hudson later this year. And for the literary fans among us, he also runs another YouTube channel in a similar vein called Great Books Explained. (via Kottke)

      Detail of Gustav Klimt, “The Kiss” (1908-09), oil and gold leaf on canvas, 180 x 180 centimeters

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      Explore Storytelling Through 300 Years of Quilts in ‘Fabric of a Nation’

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      Bisa Butler, “To God and Truth” (2019), print and resist-dyed cottons, cotton velvet, rayon satin, and knotted string, pieced, appliquéd, and quilted; 117 1/2 x 140 5/8 inches. Photos © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. All images courtesy of Frist Art Museum, shared with permission

      Explore Storytelling Through 300 Years of Quilts in ‘Fabric of a Nation’

      June 25, 2025

      ArtCraftHistory

      Kate Mothes

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      While we often associate quilts with their function as bedspreads or an enjoyable hobby, the roots of the craft run very deep. The art form has long been associated with storytelling, and numerous styles have enabled makers to share cultural symbols, memories, and autobiographical details through vibrant color and pattern.

      African American quilters have significantly influenced the practice since the 17th century, when enslaved people began sewing scraps of fabric to make blankets for warmth. Through artists like Harriet Powers in the 19th century or the Gee’s Bend Quilters, this powerful mode of expression lives on in rich tapestries and textile works being made today.

      Civil War Zouave Quilt (1863–64), wool plain weave and twill, cotton plain weave and other structures, leather; pieced, appliquéd, and embroidered with silk. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

      A new exhibition titled Fabric of a Nation: American Quilt Stories from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston opens this week at the Frist Art Museum, surveying nearly 50 quilts from the MFA’s collection. Works span the 19th through 21st centuries, with bold textiles by contemporary artists like Bisa Butler included alongside Civil War-era examples and commemorative album quilts.

      Stories play a starring role in Fabric of a Nation, which delves into the socio-political contexts in which the pieces were made and how narrative, symbolism, and autobiography shaped their compositions. For example, a unique Civil War quilt completed by an unknown maker in 1864 repurposes fabric from Zouave uniforms. Small panels featuring birds, soldiers on horseback, and the American flag transport us to a time when the U.S. had been at war for three years.

      Another fascinating piece is another flag composition in which the stripes have been stitched with dozens of names, including Susan B. Anthony near the top of one of the central columns. Known as the “Hoosier Suffrage Quilt,” it’s thought to chronicle suffrage supporters.

      More recently, Michael C. Thorpe’s untitled work features the bold appliquéd words “Black Man” over pieced batik fabrics. Butler’s large-scale “To God and Truth” is a colorful reimagining of an 1899 photograph. She transforms a black-and-white image into a vibrant, patterned portrait of the African American baseball team of Morris Brown College, Atlanta.

      Fabric of a Nation opens on June 27 and continues through October 12 in Nashville. Find more and plan your visit on the museum’s website. You might also enjoy exploring more quilts by Black Southern makers or Stephen Townes’ embroidered tableaux of leisure in the Jim Crow South.

      Michael C. Thorpe, Untitled (2020), printed cotton plain weave and batting; machine quilted, 20 x 16 inches

      Hoosier Suffrage Quilt (before 1920), cotton plain weave, pieced, embroidered, and quilted. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

      Unidentified maker. Peacock Alley Chenille Bedspread (1930–40s), cotton plain weave, embroidered with cotton pile; 99 x 88 1/2 inches. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

      Baltimore album quilt (c. 1847–50), cotton plain weave, pieced, appliquéd, quilted, and embroidered ink. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

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      Ireland’s Oldest and Largest Medieval Book Shrine Goes on Public View for the First Time

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      Book shrine discovered at Lough Kinale, Tonymore North, County Longford, Ireland. All images courtesy of the National Museum of Ireland, shared with permission

      Ireland’s Oldest and Largest Medieval Book Shrine Goes on Public View for the First Time

      June 24, 2025

      ArtBooksCraftHistory

      Kate Mothes

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      In an unassuming lake in Ireland’s northern County Longford, an unprecedented find emerged in 1986. Thanks to the sediments in the body of water, pieces of a unique, highly decorated metal object dating to the 9th century were remarkably preserved. And now, after a 39-year conservation project, the nation’s oldest and largest medieval book shrine is now on view.

      Known as the Lough Kinale Book Shrine after its namesake lake, the object features a series of medallions with precious stone inserts, along with embellished metalwork in the form of a cross. Part of the exhibition Words on the Wave: Ireland and St. Gallen in Early Medieval Europe at the National Museum of Ireland, Kildare Street, the stunning artifact is complemented by a number of pieces contemporary to its day.

      Detail of the Lough Kinale book shrine

      The shrine’s metal is bronze and encompasses an oak container, which would have held a treasured manuscript associated with a Christian saint. Used to convey the volume to various ceremonial activities, it also would have originally featured a leather strap to make it easier to transport.

      Words on the Wave also includes a Viking sword uncovered in the River Shannon in Limerick and a beautiful example of a medieval brooch-pin, the Ardshanbally Brooch, which dates to the 8th or 9th century.

      Thanks to scientific analysis, manuscripts on loan from the Abbey Library in St. Gall, Switzerland, have also been confirmed to have originated in Ireland. Researchers determined that the vellum pages were made from the hides of Irish cattle, and monks traveled with the books to Switzerland more than a thousand years ago. This exhibition marks the first time in more than a millennium that the illuminated tomes have resided in Ireland.

      Words on the Wave continues in Dublin through October 24. Learn more and plan your visit on the museum’s website.

      Irish Evangelary from St. Gall (Quatuor evangelia), Cod. Sang. 51, p. 78. © Stiftsbibliothek, St. Gallen

      Detail of the Lough Kinale book shrine

      Detail of the Lough Kinale book shrine

      Detail showing St Matthew applying a scribal knife or scraper to a page and dipping his pen in an inkwell (Cod. Sang. 1395, p. 418). © Stiftsbibliothek, St. Gallen

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      Roméo Mivekannin’s Cage-Like Sculptures of Museums Reframe the Colonial Past

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      Photos by Gerret Schultz. All images courtesy of the artist and Galerie Barbara Thumm, shared with permission

      Roméo Mivekannin’s Cage-Like Sculptures of Museums Reframe the Colonial Past

      June 24, 2025

      ArtHistorySocial Issues

      Kate Mothes

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      Known for bold, chiaroscuro paintings that reimagine European art historical masterworks in his own likeness, Roméo Mivekannin is interested in the Western, colonial gaze on Africa and the power of archives to reveal underrepresented or untold stories. Born on the Ivory Coast, Mivekannin splits his time between Toulouse, France, and Cotonou, Benin. His practice interrogates visibility, appropriation, and power dynamics through direct and unflinching pieces spanning acrylic painting, installation, and sculpture.

      At Art Basel last weekend, in collaboration with Galerie Barbara Thumm and Cécile Fakhoury, Mivekannin presented a large-scale installation titled Atlas, comprising a series of metal buildings suspended from the ceiling. Modeled after institutional buildings—in this case, museums that house enthographic collections—the artist draws attention to the colonialist practices and ethical gray areas that permeate these spaces and their histories.

      Often founded upon controversial or dubiously-acquired personal collections of European urban elites, larger museums historically emphasized what was seen as “primitive” or “exotic,” exhibiting a skewed view of world cultures framed by a colonialist mindset. The British Museum, for example, was established in 1753 upon the death of Sir Hans Sloane, whose collection of more than 80,000 “natural and artificial rarities” provided the institution’s foundation. His wealth—and his collection—was amassed in part through enslaved labor on his sugar plantations in Jamaica.

      Another well-known example of problematic collections include thousands of Benin Bronzes, housed in European institutions like the British Museum and others. British forces acquired many of these elaborately decorated plaques through pillage and looting in the late 19th century. Today, some museums have agreed to repatriate the bronzes to redress this historical indignity (the British Museum is still in discussions).

      As a student of both art and architecture, Mivekannin taps into the way certain structures and built environments are designed to convey prestige and dominance. He is also currently pursuing a Ph.D. at the National Superior School of Architecture of Montpellier (ENSAM).

      In Atlas, the structures take on the form of bird cages suspended from chains. Both elements symbolize captivity, likening ethnographic collections that often include human remains to what the Atlas exhibition statement describes as “human zoos.” In this context, the cages “serve as a reminder of the historical practices that sought to control and exploit ‘the Other.’”

      Mivekannin bridges past and present in this installation, inviting viewers to walk around the museums within a space that shifts the power dynamic. The work encourages viewers “to confront uncomfortable truths about colonial legacies and their ongoing impact on our contemporary society.”

      The artist scales down the museums’ palatial details to a diminutive size, displayed low, taking into consideration a kind of meta experience of the exhibition itself. In Mivekannin’s portrayal, the structures are both the cages and the caged.

      A show of the artist’s paintings, Black Mirror, is currently on view at Collezione Maramotti in Reggio Emilia, Italy, through July 27. See more on the artist’s Instagram.

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