Museums are not known for their nimble response to current events—especially not museums as large as New York’s Museum of Modern Art. But when MoMA makes a statement, the art world notices. And over the weekend, the New York institution’s curatorial team opted to turn over one of its permanent collection galleries to artists born in present-day Ukraine.
The gallery, titled “In Solidarity,” includes many well-known Eastern European figures: Kazimir Malevich, Ilya Kabakov, Sonia Delaunay-Terk. Others, like Louise Nevelson, Milton Resnick, Janet Sobel, and Arthur Fellig (better known as the photographer Weegee) found fame after they emigrated to cities like Paris and Germany. A great deal of the featured artists, the museum notes, are of Jewish descent and “found safe haven from persecution in New York City.”
The dynamic and propulsive sculpture Symphony Number 1 (1913) by Vladimir Baranoff-Rossiné anchors the room, connecting the abstract, handmade, and industrial aesthetics nearby. Louise Nevelson’s monochromatic black sculpture is juxtaposed with the colorful geometry of Sonia Delaunay-Terk’s work, bringing together the everyday and the mystical.
In a statement, the museum said it assembled these vast examples of artistry “as a statement of solidarity with, and in tribute to, the people of Ukraine.”
MoMA previously answered current events with its collection when it swiftly integrated work by artists from the Muslim-majority countries affected by Trump’s travel ban into its galleries in 2017.
In the new “In Solidarity” gallery, a poem by the beloved Ukrainian author Serhiy Zhadan is framed alongside a translation from Ukrainian by John Hennessy and Ostap Kin.
Read the poem below, and then get a closer look at the works on view.
Let’s start with what’s most difficult—with singing
and quenching the fires emerging from the night.
Let’s start by whispering the names,
let’s weave together the vocabulary of death.
To stand and talk about the night.
Stand and listen to the voices
of shepherds in the fog
incanting over every single
lost soul.
Почнімо з найтяжчого — зі співу й гасіння вогню,
який підступає з ночі.
Почнімо із шепотіння імен,
виплітаймо разом цю лексику смерті.
Стояти і говорити про ніч.
Стояти і наслухати з туману
голоси пастухів,
що оспівують кожну
загублену душу.
Aleksander Archipenko, Figure in Movement (1913). © 2022 Estate of Alexander Archipenko / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art.
Vladimir Baranoff-Rossiné, Symphony Number 1 (1913). © 2022 Wladimir Baranoff-Rossiné ARS/ADAGP. Courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art.
Louise Nevelson, That Silent Place (1954-55). © 2022 Estate of Louise Nevelson / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art.
Installation view of the gallery “In Solidarity” (Gallery 507). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © 2022 MoMA, N.Y. Photo by Robert Gerhardt.
Installation view of the gallery “In Solidarity” (Gallery 507). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © 2022 MoMA, N.Y. Photo by Robert Gerhardt.
Installation view of the gallery “In Solidarity” (Gallery 507). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © 2022 MoMA, N.Y. Photo by Robert Gerhardt.
Installation view of the gallery “In Solidarity” (Gallery 507). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © 2022 MoMA, N.Y. Photo by Robert Gerhardt.
Installation view of the gallery “In Solidarity” (Gallery 507). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © 2022 MoMA, N.Y. Photo by Robert Gerhardt.
Installation view of the gallery “In Solidarity” (Gallery 507). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © 2022 MoMA, N.Y. Photo by Robert Gerhardt.
Installation view of the gallery “In Solidarity” (Gallery 507). The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © 2022 MoMA, N.Y. Photo by Robert Gerhardt.