PHOENIX (September 2, 2026) –For the 2026–2027 season, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) is pleased to announce that internationally acclaimed artist Jeffrey Gibson (a member of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians and of Cherokee descent) will appear in conversation with the Executive Director and Chief Curator of Forge Project, Candice Hopkins (citizen of Carcross/Tagish First Nation), for the fall Lenhardt Lecture. Celebrated contemporary artist Kelly Akashi will come to Phoenix in April as the spring Lenhardt Lecture speaker. Widely recognized as one of the leading contemporary American artists working today, Gibson has earned international recognition for his multidisciplinary practice, which synthesizes Indigenous traditions and aesthetics with layered references to contemporary culture and global histories. He will appear in dialogue with Hopkins, whose writing and curatorial practice explore the intersections of history, contemporary art, and Indigeneity. The Museum will present Gibson and Hopkins on October 14, 2026. Tickets to the Lenhardt Lecture featuring Gibson and Hopkins on October 14 at 6:30 pm are live here.

On April 14, 2027, PhxArt welcomes Kelly Akashi, whose work is already familiar to Museum audiences through Polar Vista, acquired by the Museum in 2023 and currently on view in the Katz Wing for Modern Art. Tickets to the spring Lenhardt Lecture featuring Akashi are here. Lenhardt Lecture tickets are free for Museum Members and $5 for the public.

“We are honored to welcome Jeffrey Gibson, Candice Hopkins, and Kelly Akashi to Phoenix Art Museum as the next speakers in our esteemed Lenhardt Lecture series,” said Jeremy Mikolajczak, the Sybil Harrington Director and CEO of Phoenix Art Museum. “Among the most influential artists working today, Gibson and Akashi each bring deeply personal yet universally resonant perspectives that illuminate the stories, histories, and lived experiences shaping our world, while Hopkins has curated some of the most significant exhibitions in the past decade to reframe art history through an Indigenous lens. As we approach the 10th anniversary of the Lenhardt Contemporary Art Initiative, including the Lenhardt Lecture series, we celebrate the extraordinary impact the program has had on our Museum and our community. Through the generosity and vision of the Lenhardt family, we have welcomed many of the defining artists and cultural voices of our time, creating opportunities for meaningful dialogue while expanding the voices, narratives, and perspectives represented throughout PhxArt’s exhibitions, programs, and collection.”

Jeffrey Gibson (American, b. 1972) is an interdisciplinary artist, curator, and convener, celebrated for his work in painting, installation, video, and performance. Over two decades, he has examined how language, pattern, and music construct meaning, synthesizing Indigenous and Western traditions through vibrant color, complex patterning, and layered sound. A member of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians and of Cherokee descent, Gibson represented the U.S. at the 2024 Venice Biennale with his acclaimed exhibition the space in which to place me, which made its U.S. debut at The Broad in Los Angeles in May 2025. In June 2025, he unveiled a site-specific installation at Kunsthaus Zurich and that same year was selected for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Genesis Facade Commission. His work is held in major collections including MoMA, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and the National Gallery of Art.

Gibson will be joined in October by Candice Hopkins.A citizen of Carcross/Tagish First Nation, Hopkins is the Executive Director and Chief Curator of Forge Project, Taghkanic, New York, and Fellow in Indigenous Art History and Curatorial Studies at Bard College. She is curator of the exhibitions Indian Theater: Native Performance, Art, and Self-Determination Since 1969; Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts, co-curated with Dylan Robinson; and ᑕᑯᒃᓴᐅᔪᒻᒪᕆᒃ Double Vision, featuring textiles, prints and drawings by Jessie Oonark, Janet Kigusiuq, and Victoria Mamnguqsualuk. She was also the Senior Curator for the inaugural 2019 and 2022 editions of the Toronto Biennial of Art and part of the curatorial team for the Canadian Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale, among other accomplishments.

Kelly Akashi (b. 1983, Los Angeles) uses material transformation to give physical form to memory, inheritance, and loss. Working across glass, bronze, crystal, stone, and ash, she renders fragile or ephemeral matter into enduring forms, creating works that hold traces of touch, labor, and impermanence and are grounded in a practice defined by deep material engagement and a conceptual approach. Akashi’s work has been presented in solo exhibitions at the San Jose Museum of Art, Frye Art Museum, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, Henry Art Gallery, SculptureCenter, and Galleria d’Arte Moderna di Milano. She has also created public commissions for JFK International Airport’s New Terminal One, as well as projects with the Aspen Art Museum, Clark Art Institute, and the Hyundai Terrace for the 2026 Whitney Biennial. She is the recipient of the 2024 Distinguished Women in the Arts Award from MOCA Los Angeles, among many other distinctions. Akashi’s work Polar Vista(1993–2023) is on view now in the Museum’s Katz Wing for Modern Art and was aquired by the institution in 2023.

“Dawn and I are thrilled that Jeffrey Gibson, Candice Hopkins, and Kelly Akashi are joining us this season for the Lenhardt Lecture series,” said David Lenhardt, a member of the Museum’s Board of Trustees. “Gibson and Akashi are both masters at layering cultural references, media, and meaning through their practices. Their artworks encourage deep looking and reward the viewer with new discoveries each time they engage. We are also excited to welcome Hopkins, whose commitment to advancing Indigenous practices in contemporary art has made such a transformative impact. We are grateful they will be sharing their meaningful stories and insights with our Phoenix community.”

In addition to their presentations at Phoenix Art Museum, Gibson and Akashi will engage with local artists and creatives as part of the educational and community-based component integral to the series. Each year, Lenhardt Lecture speakers give back and work with Arizona-based creators in various capacities to provide vital mentorship.

For more information about the Lenhardt Lecture series, contact the Communications Office of Phoenix Art Museum at press@phxart.org. For high-resolution images, click here.

About Jeffrey Gibson

Jeffrey Gibson (American, b. 1972) is an interdisciplinary artist, curator, and convener celebrated for his work in painting, installation, video, and performance. For over two decades, he has examined how language, pattern, and music construct meaning, synthesizing Indigenous and Western traditions through vibrant color, complex patterning, and layered sound. A member of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians and of Cherokee descent, Gibson represented the U.S. at the 2024 Venice Biennale with his acclaimed exhibition the space in which to place me, which made its U.S. debut at The Broad in Los Angeles in May 2025. In June 2025, he unveiled a site-specific installation at Kunsthaus Zurich. Gibson was selected for the Metropolitan Museum’s 2025 Genesis Facade Commission, and his monumental bronze sculptures will be on view through June 2026. His work is held in major collections including MoMA, the Whitney, the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and the National Gallery of Art. He lives in New York’s Hudson Valley and is artist-in-residence at Bard College.

About Candice Hopkins

Candice Hopkins is a citizen of Carcross/Tagish First Nation and lives in Red Hook, New York. Her writing and curatorial practice explore the intersections of history, contemporary art, and Indigeneity. She is Executive Director & Chief Curator of Forge Project, Taghkanic, New York, and Fellow in Indigenous Art History and Curatorial Studies, Bard College. She is curator of the exhibitions Indian Theater: Native Performance, Art, and Self-Determination Since 1969, Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts, co-curated with Dylan Robinson, and ᑕᑯᒃᓴᐅᔪᒻᒪᕆᒃ Double Vision, featuring textiles, prints and drawings by Jessie Oonark, Janet Kigusiuq, and Victoria Mamnguqsualuk. She was the Senior Curator for the inaugural 2019 and 2022 editions of the Toronto Biennial of Art and part of the curatorial team for the Canadian Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale, featuring the work of the media collective Isuma; as well as documenta 14, Athens and Kassel; and Sakahàn: International Indigenous Art, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa. Her notable essays include “The Gilded Gaze: Wealth and Economies on the Colonial Frontier,” in the documenta 14 Reader; “Outlawed Social Life,” in South as a State of Mind; and “The Appropriation Debates (or The Gallows of History),” in Saturation: Race, Art, and the Circulation of Value (New Museum/MIT Press, 2020).

About Kelly Akashi

Kelly Akashi (b. 1983) uses material transformation to give physical form to memory, inheritance, and loss, translating intimate objects into sculptures that register time and change. Her practice is grounded in deep material engagement, where learning processes such as glassblowing, stone carving, casting, and candle-making becomes integral to her conceptual approach. She approaches mortality as a contemplative condition, attentive to the quiet dignity of transience. Akashi serves as Core Faculty in Grad Art at ArtCenter College of Design. Her work has been presented in solo exhibitions at the San Jose Museum of Art, Frye Art Museum, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, Henry Art Gallery, SculptureCenter, and Galleria d’Arte Moderna di Milano. Public commissions include a monumental installation for JFK International Airport’s New Terminal One, an outdoor sculpture commission for Williams College Museum of Art, projects with the Aspen Art Museum, Clark Art Institute, and the Hyundai Terrace for the 2026 Whitney Biennial. She is the recipient of the 2024 Distinguished Women in the Arts Award from MOCA Los Angeles and grants from the Trellis Fund, the Andy Warhol Foundation, LACMA Art + Tech, Peter S. Reed Foundation, and Tieger Foundation.

About the Lenhardt Lecture and the Lenhardt Contemporary Art Initiative

Since 2018, the Lenhardt Lecture series has engaged Valley audiences with some of the most acclaimed contemporary artists in the world. Featured speakers have included Jim Hodges, Shara Hughes, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Arcmanoro Niles, Teresita Fernández in conversation with Amalia Mesa-Bains, Derek Fordjour, Rashid Johnson, Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe in conversation with Larry Ossei-Mensah, Leonardo Drew, Lily Stockman, Eamon Ore-Giron, Charles Gaines in conversation with Thelma Golden, Adam Pendelton in conversation with Dr. Adrienne Edwards, and Caroline Kent. The program also includes an educational and community-based component. All Lenhardt Lecture speakers engage with local artists and creatives, working with Arizona-based creators in various capacities to provide vital mentorship.

The Lenhardt Lecture is a key component of the Lenhardt Contemporary Art Initiative. Established in 2017 through the generosity of the Arizona-based Lenhardt family, the Lenhardt Contemporary Art Initiative deepens the Museum’s commitment to contemporary art through various programs, namely the Lenhardt Lectures, which engage Valley audiences with some of the most acclaimed contemporary artists in the world; the Lenhardt Contemporary Art Acquisition Fund, which enables Phoenix Art Museum to collect works by contemporary artists; and the Dawn and David Lenhardt Gallery, designated for the presentation of contemporary art, including works acquired with funds from the Lenhardt Contemporary Art Initiative, loans from national and local collectors, and a rotating series of artworks from the Lenhardts’ own collection. In 2021, the initiative was expanded to support the diversification of the contemporary art collection of Phoenix Art Museum through the acquisition of works by artists contributing to discourses on race, gender, and other socially relevant concerns, including those by Black, Indigenous, Latinx, and women artists, among others. Since 2017, the Museum has acquired artworks by Shara Hughes, Arcmanoro Niles, Derek Fordjour, Rashid Johnson, Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe and Lily Stockman with funds from the Lenhardt Contemporary Art Initiative.

About Phoenix Art Museum

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and experiences with art. Each year, 300,000 guests on average engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion design, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. PhxArt also presents live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education programs and workshops, a monthly live-music series, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880.

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FEATURED EVENTS

Films at PhxArt: American Pachuco with Director David Alvarado + Producer Everett Katigbak

Wednesday, September 2 | 6 p.m.

$10 for Members | $15 for Non-Members

Against political resistance and industry skepticism, Luis Valdez pushed Chicano storytelling from the fields to the film screen, crafting iconic works that challenge, celebrate and expand America’s story. In the 1960s, his El Teatro Campesino performed on flatbed trucks and helped mobilize workers to win the first farmworker union contract. His Zoot Suit was the first Chicano play on Broadway. Despite critical rejection that killed the show, he persevered, creating La Bamba—a blockbuster breakout film that authentically depicted Mexican American life to the world. Now in its 60th year, El Teatro continues to be a beacon for Latino/a creators. American Pachuco is the story of an artist who gave voice to the overlooked and opened pathways for generations. Featuring interviews with Linda Ronstadt, Lou Diamond Phillips, Cheech Marin, Delores Huerta and Edward James Olmos. Winner of both the Audience and Jury awards at the Sundance film festival.

Tickets are available here.

SOUNDCHECK | Meat Puppets

Friday, September 25 | 7 p.m.

$10 for Members | $28 for the public* 

*Tickets include all-day access to the Museum

SOUNDCHECK is back. One Friday per month from 7–8 p.m., Phoenix Art Museum turns into a live-music venue for one hour, with unplugged sets, local and regional acts, and art all around you.

Season two of SOUNDCHECK kicks off with Arizona Hall of Fame recipients the Meat Puppets. Formed in Phoenix in the early 1980s, the Meat Puppets turned punk’s creative freedom loose on country, psychedelia and Southwestern desert weirdness, making landmark albums like “Meat Puppets II” and “Up on the Sun” before Kurt Cobain brought brothers Curt and Cris Kirkwood onstage for Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged and introduced them to a generation. More than 40 years later, the founding trio is back together, joined by keyboardist Ron Stabinsky and guitarist Elmo Kirkwood. As drummer Derrick Bostrom puts it, “This doesn’t feel like an oldies act. It feels like the culmination.”

Tickets are available here.

SOUNDCHECK is made possible through the generosity of Presenting Sponsor Men’s Arts Council, with additional support from the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for the Performing Arts.

Kids Day at PhxArt

Sunday, September 13 | Noon – 5 p.m.

Free for Members | Included with general admission

Designed for visitors of all ages, Kids Day at PhxArt features interactive in-gallery art-making, Storytime and dynamic performances that connect participants with PhxArt’s collection and special exhibitions. This September, Kids Day celebrates the 60th anniversary of Phoenix Art Museum’s fashion collection. Explore the current fashion exhibition COLORWEAR: A Kaleidoscope of Fashion and find your signature look.

• Noon–5 p.m. | Design your own personal style with a mix and match wardrobe craft
• Noon–5 p.m. | Accessorize with a custom-made button
• Noon–5 p.m. | Strike a pose in our fashion photobooth with photographer Kenzie Rich
• Noon–5 p.m. | Learn about ACI and PhxArt’s newest publication, COLORWEAR: A Kaleidoscope of Fashion
• 1:30–2 p.m. | Join us for a reading of Elmer by David McKee
• 2–2:45 p.m. | The galleries come alive with a performance by The Phoenix Symphony

Tickets are available here. All art-engagement programming is included free with general admission.

Kids Day is made possible by Desert Financial Credit Union, the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts, The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

Summer Symphony Series

Free for Members | Included with general admission

The Phoenix Symphony is coming to PhxArt for two more performances this summer. Catch them on select Sundays during Kids Day and on select Wednesday evenings throughout the season and experience the Museum in a whole new way.

• Sunday, September 13 at 2 – 2:45 p.m.
• Wednesday, September 16 at 5 – 5:30 p.m.*

*Free-access times. Performances are included with general admission. Purchase tickets here.

OPENING SOON

Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan

Opening September 9, 2026

Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan is the first exhibition of works by the South Korean master painter Kim Chong Hak in Arizona. It features more than 80 paintings, drawings and sketches that span the arc of Kim’s long career, highlighting an aspect of Korean art from the late 20th century that is little known outside of South Korea. Born in Sinuji, Korea, in 1937, Kim Chong Hak first worked as an abstract painter in the 1960s and ultimately rejected the adoption of Western-style abstraction. In the late 1970s, he settled in Gangwon Province in eastern South Korea and home of Mount Seorak—the highest peak in the country’s Taebaek mountain range. There, he sought out an alternative artistic discourse, moving away from the monochromatic painting popular in Korea of the time and toward his own unabashedly expressive style.

Kim Chong-Hak, Painter of Seoraksan is organized by the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, and curated by Michael Rooks, Wieland Family Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art. Lead sponsorship of the publication is provided by Johyun Gallery and the Korea Foundation. Generous support is provided by the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional support is provided by Su and Al Longman, Gallery Hyundai and the Yang Won Sun Foundation.

The presentation of Kim Chong-Hak, Painter of Seoraksan at Phoenix Art Museum is coordinated by Colin Pearson, Curator of Asian Art, and made possible by the generous support of Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust Exhibition Endowment Fund, Hyunsook Jeanne Sours, and E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation. In-kind support provided by Kimpton Hotel Palomar Phoenix. Contemporary art exhibitions and projects are made possible in part by the Rob Walton, Jordan Rose, and Rose Law Group Fund for Contemporary Art. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

NEW ON VIEW

The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art from the William P. Healey Collection

Through July 11, 2027

The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art from the William P. Healey Collection examines modernity in Native American art and demonstrates how Indigenous artists have sustained, adapted and reimagined cultural knowledge across a century. The exhibition considers how visual culture was transmitted through familial lines of artists, artists’ collectives and pedagogical lineages, including the complex legacies of Native boarding schools. It also explores the power of storytelling, examining how works rooted in ceremony demonstrate continuity and resistance, while tracing evolving relationships to abstraction and modernism. Featured artists include Fritz Scholder, T. C. Cannon, Kay WalkingStick, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Emmi Whitehorse, Quincy Tahoma and more.

The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art: The William P. Healey Collection at Phoenix Art Museum is organized by Phoenix Art Museum and is curated by JoAnna Reyes, PhD, Adjunct Curator for Art of the Americas and guest curator Tony Abeyta (Navajo). All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

CLOSING SOON

Flowers of the Punjab: Textiles of India and Beyond

Closing September 6, 2026

Discover traditional textiles from the Punjab region of northwestern India, the birthplace of Sikhism. At the heart of the display is the Phulkari, a richly embroidered garment created by a girl’s female family members starting from her birth and completed by her marriage.

Flowers of the Punjab: Textiles of India and Beyond is organized by Phoenix Art Museum. It is curated by Colin Pearson, Curator of Asian Art, and made possible through the generosity of The Sikh Heritage Fund. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation, with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

Radical Clay: Contemporary Women Artists from Japan

Closing September 13, 2026

Radical Clay: Contemporary Women Artists from Japan celebrates the originality and virtuosity of 36 women artists who have explored sculptural expression outside the traditional field of Japanese studio ceramics since the 1970s. The exhibition’s 40 avant-garde works are drawn from the Horvitz Collection, considered one of the leading collections of Japanese contemporary ceramics outside of Japan, and explore wide-ranging content and motifs, including the human body, geology, flora and fantastical abstract forms.

Radical Clay: Contemporary Women Artists from Japan is organized by the Art Institute of Chicago and the Carol and Jeffrey Horvitz Collection and curated by Janice Katz, Roger L. Weston Curator of Japanese Art. Its presentation at Phoenix Art Museum is coordinated by Colin Pearson, Curator of Asian Art. Radical Clay: Contemporary Women Artists from Japan is made possible by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation and Katharine and Nicholas J. Feduska, M.D. Contemporary art exhibitions and projects are made possible in part by the Rob Walton, Jordan Rose, and Rose Law Group Fund for Contemporary Art. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

For a full list of exhibitions on view now at Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org/art/exhibitions/.

OTHER SEPTEMBER EVENTS

PhxArt Book Club: Temple of Love by Rick Owens
Wednesday, September 2 | 6:30 p.m.
Free event

Location: The Lemon Art Research Library, located inside the Museum Administration Building

For more information, click here.

Storytime
Thursday, September 3 | 10:30 a.m.
Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Storytime is made possible by First Things First, the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts, The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

Object of the Month: Celebration from the Underworld, Tony Abeyta
September 3, 5, 17, 24 | 11:30 a.m.
Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Object of the Month is made possible by CMI Gold & Silver.

First Friday

Friday, September 4 | 5 – 8 p.m.

Free general admission

Tickets are available here.

First Friday at PhxArt is made possible through the generosity of APS with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation.

Create Playdate

Saturday, September 5, 12, 19, 26 | 11 a.m. – 3 p.m. 

Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Create Playdate is made possible by The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs, and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

In Conversation: 2025 Lehmann Emerging Artists

Wednesday, September 23 | 6:30 p.m.

Free during Pay What You Wish Wednesday

Tickets are available here.

Puppet Workshop with Chris Ignacio

Saturday, September 26 |10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.

$40 for Members | $50 for Non-Members

Capacity is limited.

Tickets are available here.

National Theatre Live: Mrs. Warren’s Profession

Sunday, September 27 | 1 p.m.

$15 for Members | $20 for general public 
Tickets are available here.

National Theatre Live screenings are made possible in part by the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts.

Films at PhxArt: The Social Network

Wednesday, September 30 | 6 p.m.

Free for Members | $10 for general public
Tickets are available here.

OTHER DISCOUNTED + FREE-ACCESS PROGRAMS

Pay-What-You-Wish Wednesdays
Every Wednesday | 3 – 8 p.m.
Voluntary-donation general admission

Free for Museum Members | $10 special exhibition

Pay-What-You-Wish Wednesdays are made possible by SRP and City of Phoenix, with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation.

Military Discount

Active-duty U.S. military personnel and their families enjoy free admission from Armed Forces Day (May 16, 2026) through Labor Day (September 7, 2026) as part of the Blue Star Museums program.

About Phoenix Art Museum

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and experiences with art. Each year, 300,000 guests on average engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion design, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. PhxArt also presents live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education programs and workshops, a monthly live-music series, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880. 

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PHOENIX, AZ—August 17, 2026—In September 2027, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) and the Heard Museum will present Jamie Okuma: With These Hands, the first major mid-career retrospective of contemporary artist and fashion designer Jamie Okuma (Luiseño, Shoshone-Bannock, Wailaki, and Okinawan) and the inaugural exhibition co-presented by the two neighboring Phoenix-based institutions. Showcasing Okuma’s boundary-defying, interdisciplinary practice, the exhibition features more than 60 works from the late 1990s to the present, including objects from Okuma’s personal archive. Soft-sculptures, couture, ready-to-wear garments, and examples of beadwork demonstrate Okuma’s masterful approach to working across art and fashion design, yielding evocative pieces that are simultaneously grounded in tradition and contemporary sensibilities. A historic collaboration between the Heard and PhxArt, Jamie Okuma: With These Hands will be on view at both institutions simultaneously from September 24, 2027 through March 5, 2028.   

In a joint statement, from David M. Roche, the Heard Museum Dickey Family Director and CEO, and Jeremy Mikolajczak, the Sybil Harrington Director and CEO of Phoenix Art Museum: “We’re honored to present this landmark exhibition to the Phoenix community and beyond. Jamie Okuma: With These Hands marks a defining milestone in Jamie Okuma’s career, illuminating how her unique interdisciplinary practice has made an indelible impact in the realms of contemporary art, fashion, and Indigenous creative expression, while establishing a new framework for understanding her work within the contemporary visual arts and fashion history. This presentation further underscores the commitment our two institutions share to creating opportunities for Indigenous artists and to making Phoenix the premier destination to experience the breadth and diversity of Indigenous art and culture.” 

Jamie Okuma is an internationally acclaimed artist and fashion designer, known widely for her intricate beadwork, mixed-media sculpture, and couture works. As a child, Okuma created and began exhibiting beadwork made with antique seed beads, including dolls adorned in fully beaded regalia. Since then, her creative practice has vastly expanded, integrating traditional beading practices with the visual languages of horror film, punk subcultures, traditional powwow regalia designs, avant-garde couture fashion, and the natural landscapes of her California home to examine issues of identity and cultural belonging. 

Jamie Okuma: With These Hands situates Okuma’s work within broader cultural conversations around Indigenous authorship, identity, and culture, investigating the ways in which her practice fits within the context of other interdisciplinary artists of her generation—and what sets it apart. In addition to exploring Okuma’s practice within the framework of deep traditional connection, the survey sheds light on how she has achieved global success by reimagining and combining pop imagery, pictographic traditions, and historical patterns and iconography, effectively challenging preconceived notions of Indigenous art, design, and fashion.  

Presented across both the Heard and PhxArt, which are located less than three blocks apart in downtown Phoenix, objects in the exhibition are explored through a set of storylines, resisting the traditional thematic structures of surveys of this kind. As they move through the galleries at each venue, visitors will discover Okuma’s work within the context of family and homeland, beauty and protection, and power and defiance. Instead of standard gallery spaces with neutral walls, works will be showcased in immersive environments, inspired by geographies that have informed their creation. For example, a dress with silk-chiffon sleeves is placed in an expansive meadow scene in reference to the ecosystem’s waving grasses. Other environments present throughout the exhibition include the ocean, cityscapes, desert landscapes, and the forest, with each showcasing its own unique set of objects.  

“Jamie Okuma’s work acts as self-portraits and insists on Indigenous authorship as both a creative and a deeply personal act,” Roshii Montaño (Diné), Curator at the Heard Museum. “She challenges long-held assumptions about Native art and design while defining her practice entirely on her own terms. With These Hands foregrounds that self-determination and affirms a distinctly contemporary Native voice.”  

Exhibition Organization, Tour, and Catalog 

Jamie Okuma: With These Hands is co-organized by the Heard Museum and Phoenix Art Museum and co-curated by Roshii Montaño (Diné; Heard) and Helen Jean. It will be accompanied by an extensive catalog highlighting Okuma’s work, featuring contributions by Montaño; Gaylord Torrence, Curator Emeritus of Native American Art at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art; and Elizabeth Way, Ph.D., Curator of Costume and Textiles at the Fashion Institute of Technology; along with an interview between the artist and fellow collaborator Keri Ataumbi and a special letter from Vogue senior fashion and style writer Christian Allaire. The catalog will be published in collaboration with Scala Arts & Heritage Publishers in September 2027. Following its premiere, the exhibition will travel to the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art in Indiana.   

About the Heard Museum 

Since its founding in 1929, the Heard Museum has grown to become nationally and internationally recognized for its world-class exhibitions, award-winning publications, unparalleled festivals, and innovative educational programs. Dedicated to connecting Indigenous creativity to the world, the Heard showcases the beauty and vitality of Indigenous creative expression by presenting the voice and vision of American Indian artists. A welcoming destination for children and families, the Heard offers engaging experiences that inspire curiosity and foster appreciation for American Indian art and culture. The Heard Museum is supported by the generosity of Heard Museum members and donors, the Arizona Commission on the Arts, and the City of Phoenix Office of Arts and Culture. 

About Phoenix Art Museum 

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and experiences with art. Each year, 300,000 guests on average engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion design, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. PhxArt also presents live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education programs and workshops, a monthly live-music series, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880. 

About Jamie Okuma 

Jamie Okuma (b. 1977, Luiseño, Shoshone-Bannock) is a leading Indigenous artist and fashion designer. Okuma lives and works in La Jolla, California, where she is an enrolled member of the La Jolla band of Indians in Southern California. Okuma studied at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe and has exhibited her art since childhood, winning seven Best in Show awards for her presentations at the Heard Museum Indian Fair and Market and the Santa Fe Indian Market. Okuma’s work is held in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Albuquerque Museum, Crocker Art Museum, Denver Art Museum, Hood Museum of Art, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI), The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Peabody Essex Museum, Raclin Murphy Museum of Art, Schingoethe Center (Aurora University), Spencer Museum of Art, the Heard Museum, and Phoenix Art Museum, and has been exhibited internationally. Okuma recently became the first Native American inducted into the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) and is a 2025 CFDA Vogue Fashion Fund Finalist.  

For more information, please contact: 

The Heard Museum: 

Ivana Morales 

Senior Account Executive 

evolve pr and marketing 

Ivana@evolveprandmarketing.com 

973-864-4523 

Phoenix Art Museum: 

Sarah McNaughton / Lucia Santos 

Resnicow and Associates 

smcnaughton@resnicow.com / lsantos@resnicow.com  

212-671-5161 / 212-671-5181 

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FEATURED EVENTS

Kids Day at PhxArt

Sunday, August 9 | Noon – 5 pm

Free for Members + Summer Pass holders | Included with general admission

Designed for visitors of all ages, Kids Day at PhxArt features interactive in-gallery art-making, Storytime, and dynamic performances that connect you with PhxArt’s collection and special exhibitions. This August, Kids Day is inspired by the work of Lehmann Emerging Artist Award recipient Chris Ignacio. Renowned for his puppetry and performance, Ignacio creates work that explores emotions and identity. 

• Noon–5 pm | Use your creativity to construct a puppet craft 
• Noon–5 pm | Meet the artist Chris Ignacio + assemble a moveable figure that illustrates action and emotion 
• 1:30–2 pm | Join us for a reading of The Color Monster: A Story About Emotions by Anna Llenas 
• 2–2:45 pm | Performance by The Phoenix Symphony 

Tickets are available here. All art-engagement programming is included free with general admission.

Kids Day is made possible by Desert Financial Credit Union, the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts, The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs, and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

Summer with Sissy Art

Free for Members + Summer Pass holders | Included with general admission

In August, join local art + social collective Sissy Art (@sissyart) for artmaking in the galleries! Sissy Art offers an exciting and relaxing way to craft and unleash your inner artist with unique hands-on creative activities.

• Wednesday, August 5* | 5 – 8 pm – Drawing Club – Reserve tickets here.
• Saturday, August 22 | 1 – 4 pm – DIY Sock Puppets – Purchase tickets here.

*Free-access times. Art-making activities are included with general admission.

Summer Symphony Series

Free for Members + Summer Pass holders | Included with general admission

The Phoenix Symphony is coming to PhxArt for four more performances this summer. Catch them on select Sundays during Kids Day and on select Wednesday evenings throughout the season and experience the Museum in a whole new way.

Performance Dates

• Sunday, August 9 at 2 – 2:45 pm
• Wednesday, August 19 at 5 – 5:30 pm*
• Sunday, September 13 at 2 – 2:45 pm
• Wednesday, September 16 at 5 – 5:30 pm*

*Free-access times. Performances are included with general admission. Purchase tickets here.

CATVIDEOFEST 2026

$10 for Members | $12 for general public*

CATVIDEOFEST 2026 is a compilation of the latest and best cat videos culled from countless hours of unique submissions and sourced animations, music videos, and classic internet powerhouses. Each year, across the U.S., local theaters partner with nearby cat-focused charities, animal welfare associations, and shelters alike, with a portion of ticket proceeds from every show supporting local cats in need.

*Tickets do not include General Admission to the Museum. 

• Saturday, August 8 at 1 pm | Purchase tickets here.
• Sunday, August 9 at 2 pm | Purchase tickets here.

OPENING SOON

The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art from the William P. Healey Collection

Opening August 26, 2026

The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art from the William P. Healey Collection examines modernity in Native American art and demonstrates how Indigenous artists have sustained, adapted, and reimagined cultural knowledge across a century. The exhibition considers how visual culture was transmitted through familial lines of artists, artists’ collectives, and pedagogical lineages, including the complex legacies of Native boarding schools. It also explores the power of storytelling, examining how works rooted in ceremony demonstrate continuity and resistance, while tracing evolving relationships to abstraction and modernism. Featured artists include Fritz Scholder, T. C. Cannon, Kay WalkingStick, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Emmi Whitehorse, Quincy Tahoma and more.

The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art: The William P. Healey Collection at Phoenix Art Museum is organized by Phoenix Art Museum and is curated by JoAnna Reyes, PhD, Adjunct Curator for Art of the Americas and guest curator Tony Abeyta (Navajo). All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

NEW ON VIEW

Ecstatic Time: The Alchemy of Photography

Through January 3, 2027

Ecstatic Time: The Alchemy of Photography features nearly 100 works from the collection of the University of Arizona’s Center for Creative Photography (CCP) in Tucson that demonstrate the transformative, experimental, and whimsical nature of the medium. Featured works span nearly the entire history of the medium, presenting everything from still lifes to time-lapse and astronomical imagery. The exhibition celebrates the 20-year anniversary of the landmark partnership between Phoenix Art Museum and CCP.

Ecstatic Time: The Alchemy of Photography is co-organized by Phoenix Art Museum and the Center for Creative Photography. The exhibition is curated by Emilia Mickevicius, PhD, the Norton Family Assistant Curator of Photography. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

2025 Arizona Artist Awards

Through January 24, 2027

In NOW WHAT?, 2025 Scult Family Artist Award recipient Alice Leora Briggs reflects on human mortality and the passage of time through an intimate display anchored by her signature sgraffito works and a site-specific installation. In adjacent galleries, 2025 Lehmann Emerging Artists Awards recipient Chris Ignacio premieres a new series, Everything is Ourselves, that draws from puppetry and performance traditions to consider how animated objects function as extensions of identity, while fellow Lehmann Award recipient Jan Talmadge Davids showcases repair(ian), a series that examines the relationship among physical landscape, emotional identity, and geographies.

The Arizona Artist Awards are made possible by the Scult Family; Sally and Richard Lehmann; and the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence Fund. Alice Leora Briggs: NOW WHAT? and the 2025 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards exhibitions are organized by Phoenix Art Museum and curated by Christian Ramírez, the Cohn Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art and Director of Engagement. Their Phoenix premiere is made possible by the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence. Additional support is provided by the Rob Walton, Jordan Rose, and Rose Law Group Fund for Contemporary Art. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

For a full list of exhibitions on view now at Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org/art/exhibitions/.

OTHER AUGUST EVENTS

Create Playdate

Saturday, August 1, 8, 15, 22, 29 | 11 am – 3 pm 

Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Create Playdate is made possible by The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs, and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

Object of the Month: Something like Ezekiel: Waiting for the Transformative Moment, Michi Meko
August 1, 6, 20, 27 | 11:30 am
Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Object of the Month is made possible by CMI Gold & Silver.

Storytime
Thursday, August 6 | 10:30 am
Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Storytime is made possible by the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts, The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

First Friday

Friday, August 7 | 5 – 8 pm

Free general admission

Tickets are available here.

First Friday at PhxArt is made possible through the generosity of APS with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation.

Films at PhxArt: Do the Right Thing

Wednesday, August 12 | 6 pm

Free for Members | $10 for general public
Tickets are available here.

National Theatre Live: The Playboy of the Western World

Sunday, August 23 | 1 pm

$15 for Members | $20 for General Public 
Tickets are available here.

OTHER DISCOUNTED + FREE-ACCESS PROGRAMS

Pay-What-You-Wish Wednesdays
Every Wednesday | 3 – 8 pm
Voluntary-donation general admission

Free for Museum Members | $10 special exhibition

Pay-What-You-Wish Wednesdays are made possible by SRP and City of Phoenix, with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation.

Military Discount

Active-duty U.S. military personnel and their families enjoy free admission from Armed Forces Day (May 16, 2026) through Labor Day (September 7, 2026) as part of the Blue Star Museums program.

Summer Pass

From Memorial Day through Labor Day, get out of the heat and into our air-conditioned galleries with the PhxArt Summer Pass.

For just $75, pass holders get:

• Unlimited visits from May 27–September 6, 2026 
• Free general admission for two adults and all youth (17 and under) 

• Free monthly film screenings 
• Free access to Create Playdate + Sissy Art art-making activations in the galleries
• Free access to artist lectures
• 10% off at the award-winning Museum Store 
• And more!

For more information, click here.

About Phoenix Art Museum

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and experiences with art. Each year, 300,000 guests on average engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion design, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. PhxArt also presents live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education programs and workshops, a monthly live-music series, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880. 

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The milestone event will commemorate six decades of supporting fashion and the arts in Arizona while bringing together community leaders, philanthropists, fashion enthusiasts and supporters of the Phoenix Art Museum. The Holiday Luncheon has long served as a celebration of creativity, culture and philanthropy, helping advance the Museum’s fashion initiatives and educational programming.

As chairs, Love and Robertson will help guide planning and fundraising efforts for the 2026 event, which will take place on Monday, Dec. 7 at the Arizona Biltmore.

“What an honor and pleasure it is to serve as the Holiday Luncheon Co-Chair for this special year as we celebrate ACI’s 60th Anniversary. I can attest to the impact ACI has in supporting Phoenix Art Museum’s fashion initiatives through my previous service on the ACI Board and as the 2018 Holiday Luncheon Chair. I look forward to honoring this milestone year while helping bring our community together in support of fashion, art and philanthropy,” said Lynne Love, Co-Chair of the Arizona Costume Institute’s 2026 Holiday Luncheon.

“I am honored to serve as co-chair of the Arizona Costume Institute’s 2026 Holiday Luncheon and support an organization that has championed fashion and the arts for six decades. The opportunity to bring together community leaders, philanthropists and supporters in celebration of ACI’s 60th anniversary is incredibly meaningful, and I look forward to helping create a memorable event that advances the important work of Phoenix Art Museum,” said Andrea Robertson, co-chair of the Arizona Costume Institute’s 2026 Holiday Luncheon.

Joining Love and Robertson in supporting the 2026 Holiday Luncheon are Ambassadors Carolyn Jackson and Matthew Boland. Additional leadership roles and event participants will be announced in the coming months.

About the Chairs

Lynne Love is a respected philanthropist, community leader and longtime supporter of Arizona’s arts and cultural community. A dedicated volunteer and advocate for charitable causes throughout the Valley, she has held numerous leadership roles, including Phoenix Heart Ball Chair, Arizona Women’s Board President, Authors Luncheon Chair benefiting kidney health initiatives in Arizona and Phoenix Theatre Gala Co-Chair.

A longtime supporter of the Arizona Costume Institute, Love served on the ACI Board of Directors for five years and previously chaired the organization’s 2018 Holiday Luncheon featuring renowned London milliner Stephen Jones. She has also served on the Xavier College Preparatory Board of Trustees, chaired Key to the Cure benefiting the American Cancer Society and supported organizations including Phoenix Art Museum’s pARTy, Runway to Research and Honor Ball.

Love’s contributions have earned her numerous honors, including recognition as a Heart Ball Sweetheart, recipient of the Phoenix Theatre Women Who Care Award and a Trends Charitable Fund Fashionality honoree. She is passionate about mentoring emerging philanthropic leaders and supporting organizations that strengthen Arizona’s arts and nonprofit communities.

Andrea Robertson is a philanthropist, entrepreneur and community advocate dedicated to creating opportunities and resources for individuals with disabilities and their families. She is the founder of Lexie’s Voice Foundation and Lexie’s Ranch, Arizona-based nonprofit organizations inspired by her daughter, Lexie, that provide inclusive programming, advocacy and support services for individuals with special needs.

Under Robertson’s leadership, the organizations have grown into impactful community resources that foster inclusion, connection and empowerment for families across Arizona. Beyond her nonprofit work, she is an active supporter of numerous charitable and community initiatives throughout the Valley and is passionate about bringing people together to create meaningful change. Her dedication to service and philanthropy has made her a respected leader within Arizona’s nonprofit community.

Event Details

The 2026 Holiday Luncheon will take place on Monday, Dec. 7 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Arizona Biltmore.

Additional information on this year’s guest speaker, ticketing and table sponsorships, and other exciting programming details will be available later this summer.

2026 ACI Holiday Luncheon Leadership:

Chairs

Lynne Love

Andrea Roberston

Luncheon Ambassadors

Carolyn Jackson

Matthew Boland

Committee

Tanya Badyal
Sandy Becker
Ronna Beeson
Lisa Bell
Charlene Berge
Juliet Burgess
Linda Cohen
Meredith Cohen
Jenna Condas
Lee Courtney
Oscar De las salas
Nissa Dell
Shawnee Doherty
Carol Dries
Rebecca Fowler
Jay Franke
Elizabeth Garrett
Natalie Gaylord
Lisa Geyser
Laurie Goldstein
Suzi Hilton
Justine Hurry
Kimberly Jacobsen
Donna Johnson
Kelly Kolicko
Jill Krigsten
Joseph Leeds
Brooke Levy
Barbara Lytle
Ina Manaster
Philip Manghisi
Beth McRae
Jennifer Moser
Diane O’Malley
Joanne Osborne
Lory Parsons
Donna Pettigrew Hicks
Dawna Pitts
Sally Pope
Lisa Portigal
Helene Presutti
Sherri Quinn
Bea Rocklin
Chrissy Sayare
Jennifer Schuitemaker
Lisa Shapiro
Nancy Singer
Joy Sprink
Catherine Tuton
Vicki Vaughn
Teana Wagner
Pat Watts
Eileen Yeung

For more information: special.events@phxart.org or 602.307.2082.  If you are interested in setting up an interview with the chairs, please reach out to natalie@mcraeagency.com.

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PHOENIX (June 25, 2026) – On July 29, 2026, Phoenix Art Museum premieres the 2025 Arizona Artist Awards exhibitions, featuring works by 2025 Scult Family Artist Award recipient Alice Leora Briggs in a solo exhibition and works by 2025 Sally and Richard Lehmann Emerging Artists Awards recipients Chris Ignacio and Jan Talmadge Davids in a group exhibition. In NOW WHAT?, Briggs reflects on human mortality and the passage of time through an intimate display anchored by her signature sgraffito. In adjacent galleries, Ignacio premieres a new series, Everything is Ourselves, that draws from puppetry and performance traditions to consider how animated objects function as extensions of identity, while Talmadge Davids showcases work from her series repair(ian) that examines the relationship between physical landscape and emotional identity and geographies. The exhibitions are on view through January 24, 2027. Opening-day events include a public lecture at 6:30 pm by Briggs, who will discuss her process and works featured in the exhibition. Tickets to Briggs’ lecture are free for Members and $5 for the general public and can be reserved here (advance registration is recommended).

“In alignment with our mission to serve our local community and champion Arizona-based artists through our annual Artist Awards program, we are honored to present the work of Alice Leora Briggs, Chris Ignacio, and Jan Talmadge Davids this year,” said Jeremy Mikolajczak, the Sybil Harrington Director and CEO at Phoenix Art Museum. “This cohort brings a wide range of artistic practices that yield engaging, evocative, and intimate reflections on difficult realities that face humanity, from mortality and shifting identities to personal and collective connections to place.”

Based in Tucson, Arizona, Alice Leora Briggs investigates human frailties and mortality through mediums spanning drawings, woodcuts, letterpress broadsides, site-specific installations, and books. Approaching her work with curiosity, compassion, and fearlessness, Briggs does not view mortality as an endpoint but rather an opportunity to consider the possibilities and changes that arise as one’s life progresses. In NOW WHAT?, visitors explore the artist’s works on paper, site-specific installation, and sgraffito compositions, which Briggs creates by coating panels with clay and acrylic medium, airbrushing the surface with black Indian ink, and then using drawing tools such as X-Acto knives, fiberglass pencils, and steel wool to cut into the surface. Visitors also encounter the words of Briggs’ 104-year-old mother on the walls and embedded into the artwork itself, prompting deeper contemplations on time, memory, and the fragility of life.

A Filipino American puppeteer, producer, educator, and interdisciplinary artist based in Phoenix, Arizona, Chris Ignacio debuts his new series, Everything is Ourselves, which features mixed-media installation and video works that explore the tradition of animating objects—from prehistoric figures carved from clay and stone to digital avatars—and how this practice reveals the human impulse to construct meaning, try on and create identities, and attain cosmological understanding.

Born in Tucson, Jan Talmadge Davids works in clay and mixed media to reinterpret the landscapes of her childhood and articulate ideas of place-making. At PhxArt, she expands on her series, repair(ian), through video and porcelain works based on her observations of flora, wild clay, and the natural landscape, which stand as elegies to honor the landscapes that shape our identities and inform our sense of belonging. Her works are imbued with lamentation and hope, fragility and strength, mirroring the geographies affected by climate crisis and agricultural abuse that have inspired the artist’s work.

“It has been a pleasure to work with Alice, Chris, and Jan over this last year,” said Christian Ramírez, Cohn Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art and Director of Engagement. “These artist have built multifaceted practices with a detailed eye towards craftsmanship. Their work stands as a testament to the strength of the artistic community here in Arizona.”

If you would like high-resolution photography related to the exhibitions, or if you would like to interview any of the Scult and Lehmann Award recipients, contact the Communications Office at kaylee.weyrauch@phxart.org or press@phxart.org.

About the Exhibition

The Arizona Artist Awards are made possible by the Scult Family Artist Award; Sally and Richard Lehmann; and the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence Fund. 

NOW WHAT? and the 2025 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards exhibitions are organized by Phoenix Art Museum and curated by Christian Ramírez, the Cohn Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art and Director of Engagement. Their Phoenix premiere is made possible by the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence.

Additional support is provided by the Rob Walton, Jordan Rose, and Rose Law Group Fund for Contemporary Art. 

All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin. 

Admission is free for Museum Members and youth aged 5 and younger. Entrance into the exhibition is included in general admission for the public. Visitors may also enjoy reduced admission to the exhibition during voluntary-donation times on Wednesdays from 3 – 8 pm, made possible by SRP and City of Phoenix, with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation, and First Fridays from 5 – 8 pm, made possible by APS with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation. For a full breakdown of general admission prices and hours, see phxart.org/visit/.

About the Scult Family Artist Award

Each year, Phoenix Art Museum recognizes a mid-career Arizona-based artist with the Scult Family Artist Award. Eligible candidates must have resided in Arizona for a minimum of four consecutive years and are nominated by a group of curators, museum directors, and other arts professionals from across the state. Their candidacy is evaluated based on their demonstration of artistic excellence, active creation and exhibition of new work, and career-spanning evolution. Following a robust review process, a jury of curators, art scholars, artists, and other experts and professionals in the field from across the country selects the recipient. The Scult Family Artist Award includes monetary support of $20,000 and an invitation to present a solo exhibition of new and past work at the Museum. The 2025 Scult Artist Award jury included Lana Meador, Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, San Antonio Museum of Art; Olivia Miller, Executive Director, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at the University of Oregon; Ann Morton, 2019 Scult Family Artist Award recipient; Christian Ramírez, Cohn Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art and Director of Engagement, Phoenix Art Museum; and Jeff Scult.

About the Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards

The Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards foster the creative practices and careers of emerging Arizona-based artists. Candidates must have resided in Arizona for a minimum of one year and are invited to apply through an annual open call hosted by Artlink, a non-profit organization that has supported and amplified Arizona artists and community-based art events and initiatives for more than 30 years. Recipients receive $10,000 in monetary support and the opportunity to present a joint exhibition at the Museum with fellow Lehmann awardees. The 2025 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards jury was also assembled by Ramírez and included Ramírez; Lana Meador, Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, San Antonio Museum of Art; Olivia Miller, Executive Director, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at the University of Oregon; Ann Morton, 2019 Scult Family Artist Award recipient; and Sally Lehmann.

About Phoenix Art Museum

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art and fashion of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and art experiences. Each year, more than 250,000 guests engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions, as well as the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion. The Museum also presents vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson and is home to The Gene and Cathy Lemon Art Research Library, The Thorne Miniature Rooms, The Ullman Center for the Art of Philip C. Curtis, and Arizona Costume Institute (ACI). For the community, PhxArt hosts lectures, live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education workshops, family-focused programs, and more. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880. 

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FEATURED EVENTS

2025 Arizona Artist Awards Exhibition Opening + Artist Lecture with Alice Leora Briggs

Wednesday, July 29, 2026 

5 pm | Artist Reception

6:30 pm | Artist Talk with 2025 Scult Family Artist Award Recipient Alice Leora Briggs

Free for Members + Summer Pass holders | $5 for the General Public 

Join Phoenix Art Museum to celebrate the opening of the 2025 Arizona Artist Awards exhibitions, honoring the latest recipients of the Scult Family Artist Award and the Sally and Richard Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards: Alice Leora Briggs, Jan Talmadge Davids, and Chris Ignacio. The evening begins with a community reception, followed by an artist talk in the Museum’s Whiteman Hall featuring 2025 Scult Award recipient Alice Leora Briggs, who will discuss her technical process, recent work, and creative practice.

Tickets are available here.

The Arizona Artist Awards are made possible by the Scult Family; Sally and Richard Lehmann; and the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence Fund.

Kids Day at PhxArt

Sunday, July 12 | Noon – 5 pm

Free for Members + Summer Pass holders | Included with general admission

Every second Sunday of the month, bring the whole family to Phoenix Art Museum for a day of hands-on creativity and play! Designed for visitors of all ages, Kids Day at PhxArt features interactive, in-gallery art-making and Storytime programming that connect you with PhxArt’s collection and special exhibitions.

This July, Kids Day is inspired by the vibrant worlds of music and sound to celebrate the Museum’s newest installation, The Instrument of Troubled Dreams (2018) by Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller, and dive into a symphony of fun:

• Noon-5 pm | Compose a paper craft inspired by music and sound
• Noon-5 pm | Construct a noise maker made of everyday objects
• 1:30-2 pm | A live reading of ZIn Zin Zin a Violin by Lloyd Moss 
• 2-2:45 pm | Performance by The Phoenix Symphony

Tickets are available here. All art-engagement programming is included free with general admission.

Kids Day is made possible by Desert Financial Credit Union, the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts, The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs, and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

Films at PhxArt: Silence of the Lambs with Brian Raftery

Saturday, July 18 | 1 pm

Free for Members | Included in General Admission
Featuring a live introduction by Hannibal Lecter: A Life author Brian Raftery and a post-screening book signing

As Clarice Starling, an FBI trainee who enlists the help of the infamous Hannibal “the Cannibal” Lecter to gain insight into the mind of another killer, Jodie Foster subverts classic gender dynamics and gives one of the most memorable performances of her career. Anthony Hopkins plays the archetypal antihero—cultured, quick-witted, and savagely murderous—delivering a harrowing portrait of humanity gone terribly wrong.

About Hannibal Lecter: A Life

Drawing from exclusive interviews and previously unseen archival materials, this one-of-its-kind biography of Hannibal Lecter documents the cannibal’s journey from terrifying villain to unexpectedly adored antihero.

About Brian Raftery

Brian Raftery is a journalist, podcaster, and author. His works include the books Hannibal Lecter: A Life (2026) and Best. Movie. Year. Ever.: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen (2019). He also wrote and hosted the narrative podcasts Mission Accomplished, The Hollywood Hack, Do We Get to Win this Time?, and Gene & Roger, all produced by Spotify and The Ringer. A former senior writer for Wired, Brian’s writing has appeared in The New York Times, GQ, The Ringer, and New York Magazine, among several other publications.

Tickets are available here.

The book Hannibal Lecter: A Life will be available to purchase at the Museum Store.

Films at PhxArt is made possible by Fit Via Vi Films.

Summer with Sissy Art

Free for Members + Summer Pass holders |
Included with general admission

In July and August, join local art + social collective Sissy Art (@sissyart) for art-making in the galleries! Sissy Art offers an exciting and relaxing way to craft and unleash your inner artist with unique hands-on creative activities.

• Friday, July 3 | 5 – 8 pm* – Drawing Club with Live Clown Model
• Friday, July 24 | 5 – 8 pm – Picasso Collage Self Portraits
• Wednesday, August 5* | 5 – 8 pm – Drawing Club with Live Model
• Saturday, August 22 | 1 – 4 pm – DIY Sock Puppets

*Free-access times

Art-making activities are included with general admission.
Purchase tickets here.

Summer Symphony Series

Free for Members + Summer Pass holders | Included with general admission

The Phoenix Symphony is coming to PhxArt for six performances this summer. Catch them on select Sundays during Kids Day (July 12, August 9, and September 13, from 2–2:45 pm) and on select Wednesday evenings throughout the season (July 22, August 19, and September 16, from 5–5:30 pm*). Save the dates and come experience the Museum in a whole new way.

*Free-access times

Performances are included with general admission.

Purchase tickets here.

OPENING SOON

2025 Arizona Artist Awards

2025 Arizona Artist Awards

Opening July 29, 2026

In NOW WHAT?, 2025 Scult Family Artist Award recipient Alice Leora Briggs reflects on human mortality and the passage of time through an intimate display anchored by her signature sgraffito works and a site-specific installation. In adjacent galleries, 2025 Lehmann Emerging Artists Awards recipient Chris Ignacio premieres a new series, Everything is Ourselves, that draws from puppetry and performance traditions to consider how animated objects function as extensions of identity, while fellow Lehmann Award recipient Jan Talmadge Davids showcases repair(ian), a series that examines the relationship among physical landscape, emotional identity, and geographies.

The Arizona Artist Awards are made possible by the Scult Family Artist Award; Sally and Richard Lehmann; and the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence Fund. Alice Leora Briggs: NOW WHAT? and the 2025 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards exhibitions are organized by Phoenix Art Museum and curated by Christian Ramírez, the Cohn Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art and Director of Engagement. Their Phoenix premiere is made possible by the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence. Additional support is provided by the Rob Walton, Jordan Rose, and Rose Law Group Fund for Contemporary Art. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

Ecstatic Time: The Alchemy of Photography

Ecstatic Time: The Alchemy of Photography

Opening July 29, 2026

Ecstatic Time: The Alchemy of Photography features nearly 100 works from the collection of the University of Arizona’s Center for Creative Photography (CCP) in Tucson that demonstrate the transformative, experimental, and whimsical nature of the medium. Featured works span nearly the entire history of the medium, presenting everything from still lifes to time-lapse and astronomical imagery. The exhibition celebrates the 20-year anniversary of the landmark partnership between Phoenix Art Museum and CCP.

Ecstatic Time: The Alchemy of Photography is co-organized by Phoenix Art Museum and the Center for Creative Photography. The exhibition is curated by Emilia Mickevicius, PhD, the Norton Family Assistant Curator of Photography. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

NEW ON VIEW

Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller: The Instrument of Troubled Dreams

Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller: The Instrument of Troubled Dreams

On view through 2027

The Instrument of Troubled Dreams by Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller is now on view to Arizona audiences for the first time. Internationally recognized Canadian artists Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller are known for their immersive multimedia sound installations and audio and video walking tours that invite visitor engagement and sensory engagement. The Instrument of Troubled Dreams is an interactive, room-sized audio installation featuring a replica of a 1960s Mellotron, 23 speakers encircling the listener/performer, and chairs. Museum visitors are invited to sit and play the instrument, experiencing a range of music, vocal tracks, and background sounds played back in full spherical surround.

Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller’s The Instrument of Troubled Dreams is on loan from the Diane and Bruce Halle Collection.Contemporary art exhibitions and projects are made possible in part by the Rob Walton, Jordan Rose, and Rose Law Group Fund for Contemporary Art. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

Modern Treads: The Discount Tire Poster Collection

Modern Treads: The Discount Tire Poster Collection

On view through January 3, 2027

Following the urbanization of Paris, industry giants such as Michelin, Dunlop, Continental, Pirelli, and Goodyear followed in the footsteps of talented lithographers and recognized posters as an effective form of communication.

Modern Treads: The Discount Tire Poster Collection features 15 oversized posters from approximately 1900 to 1930 that celebrate industrial innovation and the growing popularity of the automobile. Drawn exclusively from the Collection of Discount Tire, the posters trace both artistic innovation and industrial transformation.

Modern Treads: The Discount Tire Poster Collection is organized by Phoenix Art Museum and co-curated by Rachel Sadvary Zebro, Associate Curator of Collections and Susan Driver, Curator, Collection of Discount Tire. Modern Treads: The Discount Tire Poster Collection is made possible by Presenting Sponsor Men’s Arts Council. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

CLOSING SOON

Florentine Baroque: The Haukohl Collection

Florentine Baroque: The Haukohl Collection

Closing July 26, 2026

Florentine Baroque: The Haukohl Collection presents more than 30 examples of painting, sculpture, and decorative arts drawn from the most important Florentine Baroque art collection outside of Italy.

Florentine Baroque: The Haukohl Collection is organized by Sir Mark Fehrs Haukohl with the generous support of the Haukohl Philanthropies. Its presentation at Phoenix Art Museum is coordinated by Rachel Sadvary Zebro, Associate Curator of Collections. Florentine Baroque: The Haukohl Collection is made possible by FOCUS on European Art.Additional support is provided by Joanna and Mick Levin.All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

For a full list of exhibitions on view now at Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org/art/exhibitions/.

OTHER JULY EVENTS

Storytime
Thursday, July 2 | 10:30 am
Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Storytime is made possible by the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts, The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

Object of the Month: Black and White Checked Suit
July 2, 4, 16, 23, 30 | 11:30 am
Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Object of the Month is made possible by CMI Gold & Silver.

First Friday

Friday, July 3 | 5 – 8 pm

Free general admission | $10 special exhibition

Tickets are available here.

First Friday at PhxArt is made possible through the generosity of APS with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation.

Create Playdate

Saturday, July 4, 11, 18, 25 | 11 am – 3 pm 

Free for Members | Included with general admission

For more information, click here.

Create Playdate is made possible by The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs, and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.

Films at PhxArt: Network

Wednesday, July 8 | 6 pm

Free for Members | $8 for general public
Tickets are available here.

Films at PhxArt is made possible by Fit Via Vi Films.

National Theatre Live: All My Sons

Sunday, July 19 | 1 pm

$15 for Members | $20 for General Public 
Tickets are available here.

OTHER DISCOUNTED + FREE-ACCESS PROGRAMS

Pay-What-You-Wish Wednesdays
Every Wednesday | 3 – 8 pm
Voluntary-donation general admission

Free for Museum Members | $10 special exhibition

Pay-What-You-Wish Wednesdays are made possible by SRP and City of Phoenix, with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation.

Military Discount

Active-duty U.S. military personnel and their families enjoy free admission from Armed Forces Day (May 16, 2026) through Labor Day (September 7, 2026) as part of the Blue Star Museums program.

Summer Pass

From Memorial Day through Labor Day, get out of the heat and into our air-conditioned galleries with the PhxArt Summer Pass.

For just $75, pass holders get:

• Unlimited visits from May 27–September 6, 2026 
• Free general admission for two adults and all youth (17 and under) 

• Free monthly film screenings 
• Free access to Create Playdate + Sissy Art art-making activations in the galleries
• Free access to artist lectures
• 10% off at the award-winning Museum Store 
• And more!

For more information, click here.

About Phoenix Art Museum

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and experiences with art. Each year, 300,000 guests on average engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion design, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. PhxArt also presents live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education programs and workshops, a monthly live-music series, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880. 

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PHOENIX (June 11, 2026) – This fall, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) presents Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan, the first exhibition of works by the South Korean master painter Kim Chong Hak in Arizona.  The exhibition features more than 80 paintings, drawings, and sketches that span the arc of Kim’s long career, highlighting an aspect of Korean art from the late 20th century that is little known outside of South Korea. Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan will be on view in Steele Gallery from September 9, 2026 through February 21, 2027.

“Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan exemplifies the Museum’s commitment to presenting global artists whose work deepens cultural understanding and dialogue,” said Jeremy Mikolajczak, the Sybil Harrington Director and CEO of Phoenix Art Museum. “Through Kim’s expressive interpretations of the Korean landscape, visitors will get the opportunity to view works from an artist who bridges Asian artistic traditions and Western painting while offering a powerful reflection on nature, heritage, and individual expression.”

Born in 1937 in Sinuiju, Korea, Kim Chong Hak first worked as an abstract painter in the 1960s before rejecting Western-style abstraction, which he viewed as a response to national melancholy shaped by decades of hardship and deprivation. Kim lived through multiple conflicts and periods of profound social change, including the Japanese colonization of Korea (1910–45), the division of North and South Korea in 1948, the Korean War (1950–53), the turbulent democratic movements of the 1970s and 1980s, and ongoing tensions between North and South Korea.

In the late 1970s, Kim settled in Gangwon Province in eastern South Korea, home to Mount Seorak in the Taebaek mountain range. In self-imposed isolation on the mountain, he sought an alternative artistic discourse, moving away from the monochromatic painting styles prevalent in Korea at the time and toward his own unabashedly expressive approach. In addition to his own work, Kim holds a vast collection of Korean folk art, reflecting his distinctive approach to the reclamation and celebration of Korean cultural heritage. By exploring the Korean landscape, nationhood, and diverse artistic, spiritual, and philosophical traditions, Kim has carved his own expressive path, transcending the boundaries of Korean history and connecting with U.S. audiences.

Organized by the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan features works spanning the arc of the artist’s long career, introducing an aspect of late 20th-century Korean art that remains little known outside of South Korea. The exhibition includes drawings and sketchbooks from the 1970s to the present, as well as recent botanical studies on Korean hanji paper made from mulberry bark, alongside an introductory biographical video by award-winning filmmakers Jung Dawoon and Kim Jongshin of Giraffe Pictures.

“Kim Chong Hak’s work grows out of an intense, lived relationship with Seoraksan and the changing seasons,” said Colin Pearson, the Museum’s Curator of Asian Art. “Through years of self‑imposed isolation on the mountain, Kim developed an attunement to the landscape that is both physical and spiritual. His vibrant, expressive drawings and studies capture the wildness and vitality of nature while weaving together older Asian landscape traditions, Western-style painting, and influences drawn from Korean folk art. As visitors move through the exhibition, they experience how Kim uses this approach to reclaim and celebrate his cultural heritage.”

For high-resolution photography for Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan click here. Torequest interviews, contact the Communications Office of Phoenix Art Museum at press@phxart.org and kaylee.weyrauch@phxart.org.  

About the Exhibition

Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan is organized by the High Museum of Art, Atlanta. Its presentation at Phoenix Art Museum is coordinated by Colin Pearson, Curator of Asian Art. Kim Chong Hak, Painter of Seoraksan is made possible by the generous support of Hyunsook Jeanne Sours. In-kind support provided by Kimpton Hotel Palomar Phoenix.

Contemporary art exhibitions and projects are made possible in part by the Rob Walton, Jordan Rose, and Rose Law Group Fund for Contemporary Art. All exhibitions at Phoenix Art Museum are underwritten by the Phoenix Art Museum Exhibition Excellence Fund, founded by The Opatrny Family Foundation with additional major support provided by Joan Cremin.

Admission is free for Museum Members and youth aged 5 and younger. Entrance into the exhibition is included in general admission for the public. Visitors may also enjoy reduced admission to the exhibition during voluntary-donation times on Wednesdays from 3 – 8 pm, made possible by SRP and City of Phoenix, with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation. For a full breakdown of general admission prices and hours, see phxart.org/visit/.

About Phoenix Art Museum

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art and fashion of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and art experiences. Each year, more than 250,000 guests engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions, as well as the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion. The Museum also presents vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson and is home to The Gene and Cathy Lemon Art Research Library, The Thorne Miniature Rooms, The Ullman Center for the Art of Philip C. Curtis, and Arizona Costume Institute (ACI). For the community, PhxArt hosts lectures, live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education workshops, family-focused programs, and more. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880. 

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_{^{Cara Romero, Coyote Appears at Muhaḍagĭ Doʼag (Greasy Mountain), 2026, archival pigment print. © Cara Romero. Image courtesy of the artist.}}

PHOENIX, AZ (June 3, 2026) – During First Friday on June 5, 2026, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) will premiere Coyote Appears at Muhaḍagĭ Doʼag (Greasy Mountain), a new commission by contemporary photographer Cara Romero, whose first major museum exhibition, Cara Romero: Panûpünüwügai (Living Light), is currently on view at PhxArt through June 28, 2026. The artist’s first triptych, the large-scale photograph was created at South Mountain Park and Preserve in Phoenix and depicts Dre Noline who is both San Carlos Apache and Salt River Pima-Maricopa reclining within the landscape and embodying the human connection to Coyote and all animals.

“We are honored to welcome Coyote Appears at Muhaḍagĭ Doʼag (Greasy Mountain) by Cara Romero into the permanent collection of Phoenix Art Museum,” said Jeremy Mikolajczak, the Museum’s Sybil Harrington Director and CEO. “Cara is one of the most important voices in contemporary photography today, with deep ties to the Desert Southwest, and this work marks a powerful return to black-and-white film after nearly two decades of working digitally. The piece is both visually striking and deeply thoughtful in its reflection on humanity’s relationship to the land, centering Indigenous materials, perspectives, and practices in a way that feels urgent and timeless. We invite our community to join us for June First Friday as we celebrate the unveiling of this extraordinary work.”

Grounded in regional, collaborative storytelling with Native peoples, Coyote Appears at Muhaḍagĭ Doʼag (Greasy Mountain) is emblematic of Romero’s practice in touching on universal themes of women’s empowerment, environmental stewardship, and the role of landscape in shaping identity. The image’s model connects us to Coyote, who exists as both herself and a conduit for the Coyote spirit. She wears a shell necklace, a Pima cotton dress, and Pima sandals, markers of her ancestral connection to this landscape and peoples of Phoenix. Romero made the Coyote mask and collaborated with fiber artist Leah Mata-Fragua to create the model’s necklace. The sandals are the model’s personal shoes, an intimate detail demonstrating the way Romero invites her sitters to take part in the creative process alongside her.

“This photograph honors the desert landscape and Indigenous Mythos that emerges from it,” said Romero, whose homelands are on the Chemehuevi Valley Indian Reservation. “It considers flora and fauna as sentient beings and how they can teach us about being in relationship—how all living things are interconnected. The image is a gentle offering and reminder of our shared connection to our landscape.”

Coyote Appears at Muhaḍagĭ Doʼag (Greasy Mountain) is currently on view on the first floor of the Museum’s Katz Wing for Modern Art, placing Romero’s work in conversation with other contemporary artists creating large-scale works rooted in place. Organized by the Hood Museum, Dartmouth, the artist’s exhibition Cara Romero: Panûpünüwügai (Living Light), is showcased on the second floor of the Katz Wing for Modern Art, providing a focused view into the artist’s practice. Featuring 60 iconic large-scale photographs spanning a decade, the exhibition illuminates the way Romero blends fine art and editorial styles to challenge dominant narratives of Indigenous decline and erasure and to disrupt preconceived notions about what it means to be a Native American.

High-resolution photography of the new commission can be found here. For additional inquiries, contact the Communications Office of Phoenix Art Museum kaylee.weyrauch@phxart.org or press@phxart.org.  

About Cara Romero

Cara Romero, b. 1977, Inglewood, Calif. (American / Chemehuevi), is an artist known for dramatic fine art photography that examines Indigenous life in contemporary contexts. An enrolled citizen of the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe, Romero was raised between contrasting settings: the rural Chemehuevi reservation in Mojave Desert, California, and the urban sprawl of Houston, Texas. Informed by her identity, Romero’s visceral approach to representing Indigenous and non-Indigenous cultural memory, collective history, and lived experiences results in a blending of fine art and editorial styles. Maintaining a studio in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Romero regularly participates in Native American art fairs and panel discussions and was featured on PBS’s Craft in America in 2019. Her award-winning work is included in numerous public and private collections, domestically and internationally, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, Guggenheim Museum, Amon Carter Museum, Peabody Essex Museum, and Forge Project Collections, among others. Romero travels between Santa Fe and the Chemehuevi Valley Indian Reservation, where she maintains close ties to her tribal community and ancestral homelands.

About Phoenix Art Museum

Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and experiences with art. Each year, 300,000 guests on average engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion design, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. PhxArt also presents live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education programs and workshops, a monthly live-music series, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880.

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PHOENIX (June 2, 2026) – Phoenix Art Museum announces the addition of 185 works by Indigenous artists to its collection. The gift from The William P. Healey Collection of Native American Art marks the single largest gift of Native art to the Museum in its 65+ year history and strengthens the Museum’s Art of the Americas Collection by providing a major infusion of modern and contemporary works by 99 artists representing 44 tribal nations. The acquisition furthers the Museum’s efforts to expand its Art of the Americas holdings and better represent the complex and layered histories of the Americas in its galleries. Drawing from this significant gift, the Museum will premiere The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art from The William P. Healey Collection at Phoenix Art Museum, an examination of modernity in Native American art and the numerous ways Indigenous artists from the 20th century through today have sustained, adapted, and reimagined cultural knowledge. Featuring more than 70 of the gifted works, The Way We Came will be on view from August 26, 2026, through July 11, 2027.

“We are deeply grateful to William Healey for this transformational gift to the Phoenix Art Museum Collection,” said Jeremy Mikolajczak, the Museum’s Sybil Harrington Director and CEO. “These works address a critical gap in our holdings and represent a significant step forward in our commitment to telling a more expansive story of the Americas, one that not only recognizes the profound impact of Native artists in the Southwest, but also honors their enduring influence across North America and their essential role in shaping modern and contemporary art.”

PhxArt’s Art of the Americas Collection spans the 16th century to the present, with strengths in historical art of the American West, pre-modern American art, and Viceregal Latin American Art. With acquired works from the Healey Collection, including paintings, drawings, photographs, and sculptures spanning the 20th century to present, the Museum broadens its holdings to bring in vital perspectives by modern and contemporary Indigenous artists, who explore a wide range of cultural traditions and stories and demonstrate myriad forms of artistic expression. Of note, the collection offers the rare opportunity to highlight the continuity of artistic tradition across generations of families; parent-child artists represented in the gift include Fred and Michael Kabotie, Allan Houser and Bob Haozous,
Tony Abeyta, Celebration from the Underworld, 1998-1999. Oil on canvas. William P. Healey Collection of Native American Art at Phoenix Art Museum, Gift of William P. Healey. Photo: Davin Lavikka
and Narciso and Tony Abeyta. Additionally, 22 of the 99 artists represented in the collection are women, advancing deeper recognition of women artists. Placed in conversation with the Museum’s existing Art of the Americas holdings, these works will offer critical counterpoints to established art historical frameworks and enrich dialogues across collecting areas.

Featured artists in the Healey gift to the PhxArt Museum Collection include:
•Jaune-Quick-to-See Smith (Confederated Salish and Kootenai)
•Narciso Abeyta (Navajo)
•Tony Abeyta (Navajo)
•Cara Romero (Chemehuevi)
•Harry Fonseca (Miwok, Nisenan)
•Fritz Scholder (Luiseño)
•Pablita Velarde (Tse Tsan, Santa Clara Pueblo)
•Tonita Peña (Quah Ah, San Ildefonso Pueblo)
•Stephen Mopope (Kiowa)
•Oscar Howe (Dakota Sioux)
•Acee Blue Eagle (Muscogee Creek)
•Allan Houser (Apache)
•Harrison Begay (Navajo)
•Fred Kabotie (Hopi)
•T. C. Cannon (Kiowa, Caddo)
•Kay WalkingStick (Cherokee)
•Emmi Whitehorse (Navajo)
•Michael Chiago (Tho-Hono, Tohono O’odham, Pima-Maricopa)

Stemming from this major acquisition, PhxArt will premiere in August 2026 The Way We Came: A Century of Indigenous Art (The William P. Healey Collection at Phoenix Art Museum), an exhibition that brings more than 100 works from the Healey Collection to Arizona audiences. Curated by Dr. JoAnna Reyes, the Museum’s adjunct curator of Art of the Americas, and second generation Native artist Tony Abeyta (Navajo), with whom Healey shaped this collection, the exhibition will center on the concept of “survivance,” a term coined by Anishinaabe scholar Gerald Vizenor that combines “survival” and “resistance” to describe how Indigenous peoples move beyond mere survival toward an active, creative sense of presence that carries knowledge forward. Exhibition themes include the power of storytelling, the evolution of abstraction and modernism, the role and importance of place and landscape, and the ways cultural knowledge and visual languages have been transmitted through familial lines of artists, artists’ collectives, and art education and training, including the complex legacies of Native boarding schools.

“I am deeply honored to help steward this remarkable collection of Native art and am committed to caring for it with integrity and respect,” said Reyes. “I am especially excited by the opportunity to place these works within a fuller, more connected story of the Americas—one that embraces and highlights the richness, diversity, and continuity of Indigenous artistic traditions across time and place.”

An avid, lifelong collector with a deep interest in Western art and ephemera, William P. Healey developed the Healey Collection over decades in close consultation with Tony Abeyta, a partnership that helped ensure that cultural insight and authenticity guided the acquisition process. Healey prioritized purchasing works directly from artists and their estates and fostered personal relationships with reputable gallerists, including James Trotta-Bono, who served as a close advisor. Healey has demonstrated a sustained commitment to the arts through his philanthropy, including his long tenure as a member of the Charlie Russell Riders and Foundation, his service on the Board of Directors at the C.M. Russell Museum, his prior service as a board member of the Gilcrease Museum in Oklahoma, and his donation of 100 artworks by Indigenous artist to the St. Louis Art Museum in 2024. The Healey gift to PhxArt prioritizes both historical depth and contemporary voices, tracing evolving artistic expressions while honoring tradition.

“The enthusiasm and dedication to excellence I have experienced from the team at Phoenix Art Museum has been extraordinary,” said Healey. “The Museum has deep personal meaning for me over many years, making it especially significant to see the collection find its permanent home here. At a moment when the American art canon is being reshaped and expanded, I believe it is paramount that Native American artists are recognized as essential to that story. Phoenix Art Museum has made a major commitment to using this collection to help achieve that end.”

“I am honored to bear witness to how Bill Healey assembled this important collection,” said Abeyta. “It began with a vision to tell the story from the perspective of Native American artists. Too often, the Western Indigenous narrative has been sidelined or viewed through a romanticized lens. Bill sought to add an authentic testament to this American narrative. The acquisition of this collection by Phoenix Art Museum fulfills that vision by sharing it with the world. The gift of these artworks stands as a testament to his vision to clarify the achievements of Native American artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. Each painting, no matter which tribe or time period, is connected through cultural practice, innovation, and a shared quest for individualism.”

In addition to the exhibition, the Museum will highlight the Healey gift through a future publication slated for Spring 2028, which will be published in partnership with Scala Arts Publishers Inc. Essays will explore themes of resistance and cultural survival from the 1900s–1930s, the history of Native artists moving within the Abstract Expressionist/Modernist movements of the 1930s–1950s, the postwar era and emergent expressions of aesthetic and political self-determination from the 1950s–1980s, and future directions of Indigenous art. Contributors include Dr. Leah Shenandoah (Wolf Clan Member of the Onyo’ta:aká: – Oneida Nation of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy); Dr. Ashley Holland (Cherokee [EBCI]); Dr. Anya Montiel (Tohono O’odham); and Dr. Chelsea Herr (Choctaw).
For images or more information about this latest acquisition and upcoming exhibition, contact the Communications Office of Phoenix Art Museum at samantha.andreacchi@phxart.org or press@phxart.org

About Phoenix Art Museum
Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) has engaged millions of visitors with the art of our region and world. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, PhxArt creates spaces of exchange and belonging for all audiences through dynamic exhibitions, collections, and experiences with art. Each year, 300,000 guests on average engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 21,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern, and contemporary art and fashion design, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. PhxArt also presents live performances, outstanding examples of global cinema, arts-education programs and workshops, a monthly live-music series, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org or call 602.257.1880.

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