Edmonia Lewis retrospective
The Peabody Essex Museum just opened a landmark retrospective of Edmonia Lewis — 30 sculptures gathered in one show, the first exhibition of that scale for the 19th‑century sculptor Edmonia Lewis: Said in Stone at Peabody-Essex Museum. The show reframes Lewis’s work in the context of race, gender and transatlantic networks — a must‑see for anyone into art-history immersion and sculpture techniques.
On view February 14–June 7, 2026 at the Peabody Essex Museum, the show opened following a museum press release issued November 24, 2025. pem.org The exhibition was co‑curated by Jeffrey Richmond‑Moll (Peabody Essex Museum) and Shawnya L. Harris (Georgia Museum of Art). bowdoin.edu It will travel to the Georgia Museum of Art August 8, 2026–January 3, 2027 and the North Carolina Museum of Art April 3–July 11, 2027. pem.org PEM assembled a total of 115 objects for the presentation and acknowledges major support from the Terra Foundation for American Art, the Henry Luce Foundation, and the Wyeth Foundation for American Art, among other donors. pem.org The show also highlights newly conserved and never‑before‑publicly‑exhibited works identified during the curatorial research. pem.org Loans include Howard University’s Forever Free (1867) and a Bowdoin College bust recently reattributed as Edmonia Lewis’s portrait of Ednah Dow Littlehale Cheney, which will join a two‑year national tour tied to the exhibition. howard.emuseum.com A 272‑page catalogue, Edmonia Lewis: Said in Stone, by Jeffrey Richmond‑Moll and Shawnya L. Harris accompanies the show. target.com
