Nick Cave Exhibition Unveiled
The Smithsonian American Art Museum has unveiled “Nick Cave: Mammoth,” a monumental exhibition of the artist's immersive installations. The show, which blends sculpture and performance to explore race and identity, will be on view through January 2027.
- This exhibition is the Smithsonian American Art Museum's largest-ever commission from a single artist and is considered Nick Cave's most personal project to date. It draws on his childhood memories from his grandparents' farm in Chariton County, Missouri. - A central piece is a 700-square-foot illuminated table displaying thousands of found objects, including vintage tools and his grandmother's thimble collection, arranged like paleontological specimens. Another large-scale work is a 60-by-20-foot hand-beaded tapestry depicting a Missouri landscape. - The exhibition features a four-wall video projection titled "Roam," which shows mammoths moving through modern-day Chicago. It also includes bronze sculptures from his "Amalgams" series, which combine casts of his own body with natural forms like flowers and birds. - Cave is well-known for his "Soundsuits," wearable sculptures that blend fashion and art. He first began creating these metaphorical suits of armor in response to the 1991 police beating of Rodney King, designing them to conceal the wearer's race, gender, and class. - In addition to his studio practice, Nick Cave is a professor and director of the graduate fashion program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. - The exhibition is organized by Sarah Newman, the James Dicke Curator of Contemporary Art at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
