Special-Engagement Exhibition

The newest major fashion-design exhibition at Phoenix Art Museum, MOVE: The Modern Cut of Geoffrey Beene offers a rare and intimate view into the work and career of one of the most awarded fashion designers in U.S. history. At his core, Beene was a fashion rebel who ignored trends, instead preferring to design garments that began as geometric shapes and evolved into silhouettes that moved naturally with the human form. His intuitive understanding of the body informed fashions that were unparalleled in their combination of luxury, thoughtful design, and comfort. Beene’s colorful, imaginative creations have been recognized with many accolades, including eight Coty American Fashion Critics Awards and three Council of Fashion Designers of America Awards. His work has also been celebrated through various exhibitions at institutions across the nation.
THE ARCHIVE

Spanning three galleries, MOVE begins with materials and ephemera from Beene’s personal archive, on loan from Authentic Brands Group and on view publicly for the first time. Featured archival objects include candid photographs, contact sheets, press kits, correspondence, and more, all of which provide an unprecedented view into Beene’s design process, editorial style, and modern vision for women’s clothing.

The exhibition’s final gallery explores how Beene merged design with ballet as he re-imagined fashion-show presentations. In the mid-1990s, the designer chose to break from the traditional format of fashion shows and instead presented his clothing on ballet dancers, focusing attention to the essence of his work—movement. Featured throughout the galleries, video interviews with the models, dancers, muses, and collaborators who knew the designer best bring to life the brilliance and wit of the American fashion icon.

MOVE: The Modern Cut of Geoffrey Beene is organized by Phoenix Art Museum with the support of Authentic Brands Group, LLC. It is made possible through the generosity of Major Sponsors Ellen and Howard C. Katz, Partner Sponsor The Virginia M. Ullman Foundation, Contributing Sponsors Miriam and Yefim Sukhman, and Media Sponsor KJZZ/KBACH.

Additional support provided by Arizona Costume Institute, the Kelly Ellman Fashion Design Endowment Fund, and Kimpton Hotel Palomar.

ABOUT THE INSTALLATION
In 1920s Japan, philosophers and craftspeople created the concept of mingei, or folk art, to challenge the narrow definition of art and uplift the beauty of everyday objects created by average people. In this installation, various traditional everyday objects from Japan are on view to the public for the first time, including pictorial shop signs, firefighter coats, futon covers, samurai helmets, and ceramic and metal utensils that feature folk motifs and symbolic designs. Presented at the same time as Mr.: You Can Hear the Song of This Town, Beauty and Function allows visitors to discover how Mr.’s works and historical Japanese folk art each challenge traditional definitions of fine art and reflect popular imagery from the time in which they were created.

SPONSORS
Beauty and Function: Japanese Folk Art from the Mayro-Strelitz Collection is organized by Phoenix Art Museum. It is made possible through the generosity of the Papp Family Foundation and the The Mayro-Strelitz Collection.

In the 19th century, the Sikh empire flourished in the Punjab region of northwest India. Ruled by locals in alliance with the British Raj, these states and their palatial courts attracted artists, poets, and musicians. This latest exhibition in the Khanuja Family Sikh Heritage Gallery illuminates the regal stature of the period’s Sikh rulers through examples of state portraiture, precious jewelry, and military photography.

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
In the 19th century, the Sikh empire flourished in the Punjab region of northwest India. Ruled by locals in alliance with the British Raj, these states and their palatial courts attracted artists, poets, and musicians. This latest exhibition in the Khanuja Family Sikh Heritage Gallery illuminates the regal stature of the period’s Sikh rulers through examples of state portraiture, precious jewelry, and military photography.
Image credit: Unknown, Depictions of Maharajah Rajinder Singh (1870-1900) (left) of the former kingdom of Kapurthala and his Prince the Maharajah, 19th century. The Khanuja Family.

Incorporating music, dance, and drama, Noh is a form of classical Japanese theater that portrays stories, myths, and historical episodes. Noh’s all-male troupes of actors traditionally wore masks to express emotion and symbolism. This installation showcases the work of print artists who conveyed scenes of divine, demonic, and animal characters drawn from Noh plays.

ABOUT THE INSTALLATION
Incorporating music, dance, and drama, Noh is a form of classical Japanese theater that portrays stories, myths, and historical episodes. Noh’s all-male troupes of actors traditionally wore masks to express emotion and symbolism. This installation showcases the work of print artists who conveyed scenes of divine, demonic, and animal characters drawn from Noh plays.

Spanning a millennium, paintings and sculptures in this installation showcase the sensuous deities of Hinduism, including Vishnu and Shiva; the heroes of Sanskrit literary epics; and the princes of the royal Mughal court. Works by Jamini Roy, India’s master painter of the 20th century, are also on display and depict India’s people.
ABOUT THE INSTALLATION

Spanning a millennium, paintings and sculptures in this installation showcase the sensuous deities of Hinduism, including Vishnu and Shiva; the heroes of Sanskrit literary epics; and the princes of the royal Mughal court. Works by Jamini Roy, India’s master painter of the 20th century, are also on display and depict India’s people.

Artists began creating cloisonné centuries ago in Europe. From there, techniques spread throughout the Middle East to China and Japan. Utilizing fine wires and glass paste, cloisonné artists created richly colored surface patterns on a variety of objects. This installation showcases outstanding examples of Japanese cloisonné from the 19th century, when cloisonné enamel techniques peaked on the island and wares became a successful export.
ABOUT THE INSTALLATION

Artists began creating cloisonné centuries ago in Europe. From there, techniques spread throughout the Middle East to China and Japan. Utilizing fine wires and glass paste, cloisonné artists created richly colored surface patterns on a variety of objects. This installation showcases outstanding examples of Japanese cloisonné from the 19th century, when cloisonné enamel techniques peaked on the island and wares became a successful export.

Mr.: You Can Hear the Song of This Town explores the vivid, chaotic, and manga-inspired world of one of today’s most popular Japanese artists.

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
Mr.: You Can Hear the Song of This Town at Phoenix Art Museum is the first U.S. solo exhibition in more than five years to exclusively showcase the imaginative and visually complex works of contemporary Japanese artist Mr. A self-described member of the otaku subculture—characterized by obsessive interests in anime, manga, and reclusion into virtual fantasy worlds—Mr. creates feverish, graffiti-inspired paintings and cartoon-like sculptures, installations, and video works that combine high and low culture to examine themes of desire, fantasy, and trauma within Japanese society and among a global audience obsessed with social media.

With its wide range of works, You Can Hear the Song of This Town offers Southwest audiences the rare opportunity to trace the stylistic evolution of one of the most popular Japanese artists working today. The exhibition also illuminates how Mr.’s singular neo-pop aesthetic—often thought to exist in a world all its own—is a direct descendent of abstract expressionism, 19th-century ukiyo-e prints, Pop Art, and Superflat, a contemporary postmodern Japanese movement launched by Takashi Murakami.

EXHIBITION SPONSORS
Mr.: You Can Hear The Song of This Town is organized by Phoenix Art Museum, with special thanks to Lehmann Maupin and Kaikai Kiki. It is made possible through the generosity of an anonymous donor, Ronald and Valery Harrar, Men’s Arts Council, Ms. Isabelle Georgeaux, Kevie Yang, The Japan Foundation–Los Angeles, with additional support from Kimpton Hotel Palomar and the Museum’s Circles of Support and Museum Members.

Featuring works by Arizona-based contemporary artists, Sama Alshaibi: Generation After Generation and the 2021 Lehmann Emerging Artist Awards exhibitions explore themes of female empowerment, immigration status, and isolation.
Sama Alshaibi: Generation After Generation

Sama Alshaibi, Generation after Generation, 2019. Screen print mixed media, 10 panels. Courtesy of the artist.
Sama Alshaibi, Generation after Generation, 2019. Screen print mixed media, 10 panels. Courtesy of the artist.

Based in Tucson, Sama Alshaibi is the recipient of the 2021 Arlene and Morton Scult Artist Award. Her solo exhibition at Phoenix Art Museum showcases her­­­ latest projects of photographic imagery, video, and installation, which link themes of dispossession, mobility, peripheries, refuge, ecological entropy, and future and historical imaginings.

Alshaibi’s practice interrogates the social codes found in images, texts, and artifacts to question the construction of history and its impact on a speculative future. Shaped by photography’s historic and outsized role in generating the gendered and flattened representations of Middle Eastern and North African people and their spaces, Alshaibi reframes this legacy by presenting the Arab female figure as a complex site that embodies the physical and psychic realms of the individual and community when resources, land, mobility, and political agency are compromised. She activates her own body as a mobile medium in consideration of those who are violated and uprooted into physical and psychological exile or positioned as unwanted, alien, silenced, and disappeared. Her sculptural objects and installations apply spatial voids to evoke the body’s absence, serving as counter-memorials to war, forced migrations, and diaspora.

About the Arlene and Morton Scult Artist Award
The Arlene and Morton Scult Artist Award recognizes a mid-career Arizona artist. Each year, the recipient is chosen from a pool of candidates based on a number of criteria. Eligible candidates are artists who demonstrate artistic excellence through their work; are presently making and exhibiting new work; have demonstrated significant growth in their work over their careers; and have been residents of Arizona for a minimum of four consecutive years. The recipient is then selected based on the work they are currently producing, in addition to pieces they have created in the past. The award includes a monetary prize to support the creation of new work, as well as a solo exhibition at the Museum the following year.