North Carolina Museum of Art Collection Reimagined

The NCMA recently initiated a campaign to increase diversity. New acquisitions include a pair of stunning Torah finials by eighteenth-century female silversmith, Hester Bateman, and The Old Indian Arrow Maker and His Daughter, 1867, a sensitively carved marble by African American and Native American sculptor, Edmonia Lewis. With a longer acquisitions wish list at odds with budget limitations and high demand, the team took creative approaches to further augment the collection. The NCMA’s ongoing strategy is to make key acquisitions and then borrow works from other museums to fill in the gaps. Additionally, works that had not been on view in years were discovered in storage by new curators.

To shape the reinstallation, Dougherty and her team expanded on an earlier program, where they paired two completely different artworks to create “conversations between collections.” New juxtapositions are designed to shift aesthetic perceptions of connections between individual works as well as the whole collection, based on Dougherty’s observation that there are common themes, narratives, and ideas found across time and place. She looks for this “common humanity…. There is this sense of connection.” Once visitors walk through thematic galleries, the goal is that they will continue to make connections as they view the rest of the collection.

The resulting new thematic galleries include Made in the Americas, Portraits and Power, Art Conservation, and The Arts, an area devoted to all facets of creative arts expression. In the gallery, The Africa We Ought to Know, the reunion of ancient Egypt with the light-sensitive African collection was made possible by the conservation staff who found ways to mitigate the abundant sunlight in the West Building. Caroline M. Rocheleau, Curator of Ancient Collections, explains that, in addition to emphasizing that pharaonic Egypt and Africa are part of the same continent, their reunion is actually part of a larger concept: “integrating the archaeological collections with the art collections in continental groupings.” 

Dougherty describes a particular gallery, located nearby The Arts: “…[T]here's a juxtaposition of an African masquerade costume, a Nick Cave performance costume, an [Alexander] Archipenko and a [Jean-Baptiste] Carpeaux…that [combination] to me is really successful because it's…such a huge range of expression all about the same idea.” Since Cave looked at similar African pieces when developing his Soundsuits, such comparisons can also lend insight into an artist’s creative process.

The NCMA’s reimagining turns the quest for a favorite work into an opportunity to discover treasures that are otherwise overlooked. New technology is being instated throughout the museum, but in the meantime, in lieu of a digital interactive guide, a printed map highlights visitor favorites. This is not a static installation – Dougherty refers to this as a living collection where works will continually rotate. Light-sensitive items, like photographs or textiles, are to be rotated every six months. “[I]n a year, there will probably be a big change out because a lot of the loans we borrowed will then have to be returned,” explains the curator.  

Dougherty’s hope is that no matter who you are or where you are from, you will find something to connect with in the museum: “that you will see a reflection of yourself or your life on the museum walls, and that there will be this more immediate connection for all visitors.” Dougherty says, “I think the curators in general hope that what we're doing makes the entire collection relevant to visitors today, so no matter whether it's ancient American or contemporary African, it feels relevant."

Several special exhibits are also on display at the NCMA; as Dougherty points out, two share the thread of art collecting. A Modern Vision: European Masterworks from the Phillips Collection features luscious highlights from early to mid-20th-century European art history. This ticketed exhibit will be on display through January 22, 2023. Start Talking: Fischer/Shull Collection of Contemporary Art contains selected works from a promised gift to the NCMA by active collectors Hedy Fischer and Randy Shull, on view through February 5, 2023.

From October 22 through January 15, 2023, Kehinde Wiley's 2012 painting Judith and Holofernes from the NCMA collection will be displayed with the famed Italian masterpiece by Artemisia Gentileschi, circa 1612–1617. Thanks to this loan from the Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte, the juxtaposition will give viewers context for the Wiley painting through the lens of art history.