Aug, 08, 2025
Media Alerts
Phoenix Art Museum premieres Florentine Baroque exhibition, hosts comedy-themed First Friday + Educator Arts Day in August
PHOENIX (July 23, 2025) – In August, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) will celebrate the premiere of Florentine Baroque: The Haukohl Collection, featuring more than 30 examples of painting, sculpture, and decorative arts drawn from the most significant Florentine Baroque art collection outside of Italy that was assembled over more than 40 years by Houston-based art collector and co-founder of the Medici Archive Project Sir Mark Fehrs Haukohl. The Museum’s Art of the Americas + Europe galleries will remain closed through August for major renovations to key spaces, including the Thorne Miniature Rooms. The galleries will re-open in late November with new installations and artworks.
Featured events in August include a laugh-out-loud First Friday, inspired by the exhibition Funny Business: Photography and Humor. Then on August 23, the Museum hosts its annual Educator Arts Day + Cultural Resource Fair. Exclusively for Arizona educators to support arts curriculum in the classroom, the free, day-long workshop and resource fair focuses on arts-integrated learning.
Additional programming includes film screenings, Storytime, and more.
FEATURED EVENTS
First Friday
Friday, August 1 | 5 – 8 pm
Free General Admission + On-Site Membership Discount
Programming includes:
- A Bridge Improv Comedy Show from 5:30 – 6:30 pm
- An in-gallery conversation between artists Liz Cohen and Steffi Faircloth (featured in Funny Business: Photograph and Humor) from 6:30 – 7:30pm
- Live caricature artist and one-of-a-kind take-home portraits
- In-gallery sketching with Aileen Martinez
- Live music with PhxArt’s resident DJ, J-ME-LEE
- Drinks by ARTenders
- Docent guided tours at 5:30 pm + 6:30 pm
First Fridays are made possible through the generosity of APS and Lexus, with additional support from Arizona Community Foundation.
Educator Arts Day
Saturday, August 23 | 8 AM – 4 PM
Exclusive + free for Arizona educators
Arizona educators are invited to join PhxArt for a free day of celebrating arts-integrated learning at our annual Educator Arts Day + Cultural Resource Fair.
Tickets include:
- Engaging professional-development and art-making workshops
- Access to the Cultural Resource Fair, featuring more than 30 organizations
- Opportunities to network with educators from across Arizona
- Morning coffee lounge and catered lunch
- Raffle with prizes from our cultural partners
- Continuing-education credit certificate
For event reservation, click here. The last day to register is Monday, August 18.
Educator Arts Day + Cultural Resource Fair is made possible by CSAA Insurance Group.
OPENING SOON
Florentine Baroque: The Haukohl Collection
August 28, 2025 – 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, assembled over more than 40 years by Houston-based art collector and co-founder of the Medici Archive Project Sir Mark Fehrs Haukohl. Featured artworks by local Florentine artists and artists living across Europe reflect Florence’s flourishing art industry, as well as the cultural and intellectual legacy of the Medici Grand Dukes on the Renaissance and Baroque movements.
The Haukohl Collection has been shared with museums and exhibitions worldwide, revealing the broader historical significance of Florentine art within European art history. The presentation of these works at Phoenix Art Museum is the first of its kind in Arizona.
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 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.
ON VIEW NOW
2024 Arizona Artist Awards
Through January 25, 2026
Safwat Saleem: The Unrequited Love Institute and the 2024 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards Exhibition feature works by Arizona-based contemporary artists. The 2024 Arlene and Morton Scult Artist Awardee Safwat Saleem showcases his latest works in an installation that centers on immigrant narratives and the cultural loss that results from assimilation.
The 2024 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards Exhibition features works by emerging artists Elizabeth Z. Pineda and Omar Soto. Originally from Mexico City, Elizabeth Z. Pineda is an emerging artist whose practice using historical and untraditional photographic, printmaking, papermaking, and book-art processes explores issues surrounding immigration, identity, displacement, and migrant deaths that occur in the Arizona desert. Omar Soto is a DACAmented Phoenix-based photographer who creates surreal imagery that explores queer joy and escapism to navigate the marginalization they endure while living at the intersection of race, gender, and social class.
The Arizona Artist Awards are made possible by the Arlene and Morton Scult 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. Safwat Saleem: The Unrequited Love Institute and 2024 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards are organized by Phoenix Art Museum and curated by Christian Ramírez, the Cohn Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art and Director of Engagement. The exhibitions are made possible by the Cohn Fund for Arts and Culture, a founding gift of the Phoenix Art Museum Education and Engagement Excellence Fund. Additional support 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.
Funny Business: Photography and Humor
Through January 4, 2026
Spanning nearly the entire history of the medium, Funny Business: Photography and Humor offers a compelling view into the ways artists have utilized visual humor not only to provoke laughter and delight, but also as a means of resistance, an antidote to the heaviness of the world, and a way to interrogate and subvert norms and hierarchies. Drawn primarily from the collection of the Center for Creative Photography (CCP) at the University of Arizona in Tucson, the exhibition presents 70 photographs that showcase the mechanics of photographic humor, while examining the reasons for which artists throughout time have employed it as a strategy in their work. Featured artists include Liz Cohen, Steffi Faircloth, Jeff Mermelstein, Bucky Miller, Reynier Leyva Novo, among others.
Funny Business: Photography and Humor 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.
CLOSING SOON
PhxArt’s Art of Asia collection is home to the Museum’s oldest objects, with a range of works that span 1,000 years and represent numerous countries across the world’s largest continent. Exchanges East and West explores a rich period of cross-cultural exchange within Asia and with Europe and the Americas from the 16th through the 20th centuries. Divinity and Devotion in Tibet explores the art forms that distinguish Tibetan Buddhist art from similar art forms of other regions.
The Collection: Art of Asia is organized by Phoenix Art Museum and curated by Colin Pearson, adjunct curator for Art of Asia. Divinity and Devotion in Tibet is made possible through the generosity of the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation. 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.
Renovations // Thorne Miniatures Rooms + Art of the Americas and Europe Galleries
Closed through August
The second floor of the Museum’s North Wing, featuring the Art of the Americas + Europe galleries and the Thorne Miniature Rooms, is closed for a major renovation of the spaces. Refreshed galleries will open in late November with all new installations, showcasing old favorites from and new acquisitions to the Museum’s American, Western American, Latin American, and European art collections. The popular Thorne Miniature Rooms are also undergoing conservation work and gallery renovations. More information coming soon at phxart.org.
For a full list of exhibitions on view now at Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org/art/exhibitions/.
OTHER AUGUST EVENTS
August 7 | 10:30 am
Free for Members | Included in general admission for the general public
Advance registration recommended.
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, the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs, and First Things First.
LEARN // Object of the Month: Facing North, Looking West by Guanyu Xu
August 3, 5, 17, 24, 31 | 11:30 am
Free for Members | Included with general admission for the general public
For more information, click here.
August 3 | 1 pm
$10 for Members | $12 for the general public
Presented in Whiteman Hall. Limited capacity. Tickets are available for reservation here.
August 2, 9, 16, 23, 30 | 11 am – 3 pm
Free for Members | Included with general admission for the general public
For more information, click here.
Create Playdate is made possible by First Things First, The Discount Tire Endowment for Children’s Art Programs, and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs.
FILM // National Theatre Live: Fleabag
August 7 | 6 pm
August 10 | 1 pm
Free for Members | $8 for the general public
Presented in Whiteman Hall. Limited capacity. Tickets are available for reservation here.
National Theatre Live screenings are made possible in part by the Angela and Leonard Singer Endowment for Performing Arts.
OTHER AUGUST EVENTS
Every Wednesday | 3 – 8 pm
Voluntary-donation general admission
$10 off Memberships when purchased on-site
SPECIAL-EXHIBITION TICKETS: $10 for adults | $5 for youth under 17 | FREE for Museum Members
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 17, 2025) through Labor Day (September 1, 2025) as part of the Blue Star Museums program. The Museum will also extend the benefit to veterans with a valid ID.
The Blue Star Museums program at Phoenix Art Museum is made possible through the generosity of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona.
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, an art+music festival, and more for the community. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880.