Buffalo, New York
“Electric Op”
Where: Buffalo AKG Art Gallery
When: September 27, 2024 - January 27, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: Op art, short for the “Optical” movement, emerged in time with the digital age. Its undulating waves and static patterns reflect the concerns of a rapidly technologizing society. This exhibition compiles more than 90 pieces spanning six decades, all capturing our perceptions of technology through abstract expression.
Know Before you Go: The laundry list of participating artists includes Josef Albers, Peter Halley, Jesús Rafael Soto, Stan VanDerBeek, and Miriam Schapiro.
Chicago
“Neïl Beloufa: Humanities”
Where: The Renaissance Society
When: September 14 - November 10, 2024
Why It’s Worth a Look: What would it be like to stand in the position of power over a cult, a political party, or a company? Could that be you? With French artist Neïl Beloufa’s latest installation, an interactive multimedia system, it can be.
Know Before you Go: The multimedia piece, Growth, is presented alongside Global Agreement, which pulls from interviews Beloufa conducted with soldiers stationed around the world. These interviews piece together a vivid depiction of wartime unsaturated by Hollywood, army, or media sensationalization.
Houston
“Blind Folly” by Tacita Dean
Where: The Menil Collection
When: October 11, 2024 - April 19, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: British artist Tacita Dean utilizes chance-based and unmediated drawing processes to construct her work, hence the show’s playful title. The exhibition spotlights career-defining pieces across film and printmaking, alongside new works inspired by Dean’s time in Houston during the Menil’s Cy Twombly Gallery residency.
Know Before you Go: The show is Dean’s first major museum survey and was curated in close collaboration with the artist herself.
Minneapolis
“Overshare” by Sophie Calle
Where: Walker Art Center
When: October 26, 2024 - January 26, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: Our strange digitized mix of compulsive sharing and unabashed voyeurism may now seem like a foregone conclusion. But, in Sophie Calle’s work, which spans the last five decades, critics see predictions of our modern age. Her photography, videos, and objects capture the rise and rude awakening of social media.
Know Before you Go: Alongside her career hits, lesser-known works are also on display, including an unfinished commission Calle spent 10 years grappling with, in this first North American survey of her oeuvre.
San Francisco
“American Sublime” by Amy Sherald
Where: San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
When: November 16, 2024 - March 9, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: How many iconic portraits has Amy Sherald painted by now? “American Sublime” is the largest presentation of her work to date, bringing together over 50 paintings—including her captures of Michelle Obama and Breonna Taylor and a few pieces never before seen by the public.
Know Before you Go: The show also marks the presentation of For Love, and for Country, 2022, recently acquired by SFMOMA for its permanent collection.
Aspen
“Heji Shin’s America”
Where: Aspen Art Museum
When: November 20, 2024 - March 2, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: Now coming to Aspen: the first U.S. institutional exhibition by South Korean artist Heji Shin. Fashion insiders will know the name well. The art crowd, if they don't, should get ready to.
Know Before you Go: The exhibition features photography taken during the long stretch of a road trip, alongside the artist’s studies of rocket launches.
Austin
“Between Me and You” by Tavares Strachan
Where: Blanton Museum of Art
When: November 9, 2024 - June 1, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: At the Blanton, Tavares Strachan invites visitors into a waist-high meadow of dried grass. At the center stands a ceramic sculpture. Audiences encounter staples of the West African diet, systems of writing, philosophy, and culture as they stroll through the field.
Know Before you Go: Also on view is Strachan’s ongoing research project, The Encyclopedia of Invisibility—an over-3,000 page opus that captures people and ideas excluded from the mainstream.
Miami Beach
“The Miami Years” by Rachel Feinstein
Where: Bass Museum of Art
When: September 25, 2024 - August 17, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: Deeply interested in human behavior and female identity markers, Rachel Feinstein utilizes mediums spanning from sculpture to painting to performance to examine her subjects. Alongside staples of her practice, the show includes a site-specific commission, Panorama of Miami, which crawls across a 30-foot mirrored wall.
Know Before you Go: The exhibition, spanning almost three decades of work, is the first major exhibition in her hometown.
Cincinnati
“Discovering Ansel Adams”
Where: Cincinnati Art Museum
When: September 27, 2024 - January 19, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: Sometime between 1916 and 1940, American artist Ansel Adams developed from a teen playing with a camera into one of the nation’s foremost photographers. This exhibition aims to chart that course in 80 images, accompanied by personal ephemera like handwritten notes and photographic tools.
Know Before you Go: During his career, Adams undertook a quest of epic proportions to photograph America’s national parks and covered 40 of them, a number of which are featured here.
Seattle
“Be flat” by Tala Madani
Where: Henry Art Gallery
When: September 25, 2024 - August 17, 2025
Why It’s Worth a Look: Artist Tala Madani is most interested in the power of language, symbols, and other building blocks of communication to shape our cultural systems of authority. Here, these ideas are explored through paintings and installations, as well as mural-like compositions and film strip animations.
Know Before you Go: Madani also treats visitors to a preview of her forthcoming feature-length film.
