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Calendar of Events
Programs take place in the museum unless otherwise specified. Click here for public tour registration.
Highlights Tours | Thursdays–Sundays, 12:30 & 2pm
Family Tour: Eyes on Art | Every Second Saturday, 12:15pm
Recording artist Tang Sauce’s United Outkast presents a Hip Hop experience with live DJ, dancers, and rap performances. New Haven’s experimental soul ensemble Phat A$tronaut takes the stage to perform meticulously crafted arrangements. The Lost Tribe, a drum-centered Afro-funk fusion ensemble, led by multi-percussionist Jocelyn Pleasant closes out the lawn party jam session from 7–8pm.
Free. Cash bar and food trucks on site for refreshments and snacks.
In conjunction with Leonardo Drew: Two Projects.
This summer film series is curated by artist Leonardo Drew. A Raisin in the Sun tells the story of a working-class Black family living in Chicago who learns they will be receiving a substantial insurance check. Each member of the family begins to dream about what to do with the money. Free. Cash bar and snacks for purchase. Chairs provided. Events move indoors in the case of inclement weather. Please note that chairs and food brought in from outside are not permitted.
5-8pm: Summer Lawn Party: Jam Out; 8:15pm: Film screening
1961. USA. 132 min. Not Rated. Starring Sidney Poitier, Ruby Dee. Directed by Daniel Petrie.
This screening is supported by My People Community Services & BSL Educational Foundation Inc.
This film series is curated by artist Leonardo Drew. Gloria tells the story of a young boy who’s family is killed by the Mob. A neighbor becomes his reluctant guardian, and the two go on the run with a notebook that the mobsters are desperate to retrieve. Free. Cash bar and snacks for purchase. Chairs provided. Events move indoors in the case of inclement weather. Please note that chairs and food brought in from outside are not permitted.
7–8:15pm: Live music; 8:15pm: Film screening
1980. USA. 122 min. Rated PG. Starring Gena Rowlands, John Adames. Directed by John Cassavetes.
This film series is curated by artist Leonardo Drew. The exceptionally lensed fantastical drama Beasts of the Southern Wild tells the story of a six-year-old girl who must learn the ways of courage and love while facing both her father’s fading health and melting ice caps that flood her bayou community. Free. Cash bar and snacks for purchase. Chairs provided. Events move indoors in the case of inclement weather. Please note that chairs and food brought in from outside are not permitted.
7–8:15pm: Live music; 8:15pm: Film screening
2012. USA. 93 min. Rated PG-13. Starring Quvenzhané Wallis, Dwight Henry. Directed by Benh Zeitlin (Wesleyan University graduate).
Supported by My People Community Services & BSL Educational Foundation Inc.
Celebrate the end of summer with our final lawn party of the season. Cafeteria Radio will activate the front lawn with DJs. Revisionist Films will premiere unseen Leonardo Drew footage that highlights the artist’s work and creative process. A basketball hoop on Atheneum Square North brings the party around the building.
Cash bar, as well No Pork On Dis Fork LLC, SoulFully Vegan, and Ice Cream for a Dream food trucks on site for refreshments and snacks.
In conjunction with Leonardo Drew: Two Projects.
Eavesdrop on Christina Forrer in conversation with contemporary poet and fairy tale writer Sabrina Orah Mark, whose imaginative tales describe our fears, much like Forrer’s visual narratives in her tapestries. Free virtual program.
Image: Christina Forrer, Sepulcher, 2021. Wool, cotton and linen. 97 in. x 162 in. © Christina Forrer; Courtesy of the artist and Luhring Augustine, New York, and Corbett vs. Dempsey, Chicago. Photo: Joshua White
5pm gallery viewing & reception
6:30pm conversation
The American artist Tony Smith occupies an important place in the history of twentieth-century art and design. Best known for his large-scale sculptures—inventive polygonal forms made of steel, most painted black—Smith left behind a body of work that continues to defy easy classification and whose fertile breadth is yet to be fully explored.
The Wadsworth Atheneum’s decisive role in the development of Tony Smith’s artistic career serves as the historical context for a conversation between the art historian and curator James Voorhies and artists Tom Burr and Torkwase Dyson who, in separate bodies of work, have referenced Smith’s art and the modernist ideologies out of which it evolved. Matrix: On the Art of Tom Burr, Torkwase Dyson, and Tony Smith will inaugurate a new series of nomadic programs called “In Dialogue,” presented by the Tony Smith Foundation, which is committed to placing the legacy of the artist in context and in conversation with the contemporary arts.
Join us in the galleries before the event to view a selection of works by Tony Smith and the collection of abstract expressionist paintings donated to the Wadsworth by the artist in 1967. Free and open to the public with required registration. Learn more about our theater vaccination requirements.
Presented in partnership with the Tony Smith Foundation.
Stigmatized by its associations with cannabis, flameworked glass has been almost completely left out of the broader discussion surrounding the contemporary glass art movement. Recent public policy shifts and greater inclusivity within the glass art community are turning the tide, bringing long-overdue recognition to the contributions of flameworkers. Brandy Culp, curator of Fired Up: Glass Today, moderates a discussion between artists David Colton, Kim Thomas, Carmen Lozar, and Curator of Postwar and Contemporary Glass at the Corning Museum of Glass Susie Silbert about the history, artistry, and ever–advancing technology of flameworking to shed light on this historically under-appreciated technique. Listen as some of the major voices in contemporary flameworking reflect on the art form’s journey from scientific laboratories and underground studios to the mainstream art world. Free with required registration.
In 1965, choreographer and filmmaker Yvonne Rainer premiered Parts of Some Sextets at the Wadsworth Atheneum with a cast of ten performers and twelve mattresses. The work marked a pivotal aesthetic shift in the artist’s approach to movement and helped usher in a radical shift in contemporary dance. Nearly six decades after its presentation here and a subsequent presentation at Judson Dance Theater, the work’s impact continues to be felt through a recent revival and continued scholarship. To celebrate the publication of Remembering a Dance: Parts of Some Sextets, 1965/2019 (Performa / Lenz Press / Wadsworth Atheneum, 2023), Rainer returns to the Wadsworth in conversation with dancer, choreographer, and longtime collaborator Emily Coates. The artists reflect on Rainer’s pioneering career, discuss the process of reconstructing Parts of Some Sextets for the Performa 19 Biennial in New York, and consider the landscape of contemporary dance.
Free with required reservation. A book signing follows the conversation.
Presented in partnership with Performa and sponsored by the Auerbach Library Associates at the Wadsworth Atheneum. Additional support is provided by the Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation Fund at the Wadsworth Atheneum.
Image: Yvonne Rainer, Parts of Some Sextets, 1965/2019. Performa 19 Biennial. Photo by Paula Court, 2019. Courtesy Performa