BMA Acquires More Than 200 Works, Including Significant Contemporary and Historical Objects

Henriette Daux. Young Girl with Headscarf. (c. 1885)  This vibrant pastel—a rare, signed work by Henriette Daux (French, 1864-1953) and the first by the artist to enter the collection—represents a fascinating intersection between the status of women artists at the end of the 19th century and the narratives around models of color in late 19th-century Paris. This pastel was likely the product of the practice of drawing from models at the Académie Julian, a pioneering alternative to the exclusionary École de Beaux-Arts. The identity of the sitter for this pastel remains unknown, but based on her clothing and headscarf, she may have been understood to be Roma.

Margrethe Jensen. Peonies. (c. 1918)  Featuring a large peony bush in full flower in the foreground and a vista between two pine trees of the Oslofjord beyond, this impressive composition was painted by Norwegian artist Margrethe Jensen (1876-1926). Jensen worked on a large scale with artistic bravura in her handling of paint and conception of the landscape. Despite praise for Jensen by contemporaries in her lifetime, she remains largely unknown today. Peonies is the first painting by a Norwegian artist to enter the collection and expands the BMA’s representation of women artists and the transnational ties of European modernism.

Samella Lewis. Creole Woman. (1949)  Known as the “Godmother of Black Art,” Samella Lewis (1923-2022) was an artist, scholar, curator, filmmaker, and activist. She was the first Black woman in the U.S. to graduate with a doctorate in art history and fine arts, and her many accomplishments include founding the Museum of African American Art in Los Angeles, authoring the first major textbook on African American Art, and publishing the preeminent biography of Elizabeth Catlett—an early mentor. Creole Woman is a gouache on paper made during a crucial early period in Dr. Lewis’s career, when she lived with family in the Bayou Teche region of Louisiana, and reflects the complexities of Creole identification in the American South. The work is likely related to the BMA’s only other work by the artist, a screen print depicting sugarcane harvesting in the Bayou Teche region that was acquired in 1952.

Hew Locke. Souvenir 16 (Queen Victoria). (2023)  In his “Souvenir” series, British-Guyanese artist Hew Locke (b. Edinburgh, UK, 1959) brings together busts of prominent British and American royal and military figures in the form of Parian ware—a Victorian bourgeois collected art that is less expensive than marble and widely accessible for display in domestic spaces. Locke adorns these found busts with gilded and bejeweled accoutrement to explore the history of colonialism and surface histories of imperial conquests. Notably, Souvenir 16 (Queen Victoria) features military badges and replica medals from the late-19^th-century Ugandan and Zulu Wars, the Benin campaign, and the second Afghan War. This is the first work by Locke to enter the collection.

Roberto Lugo. “Four Centuries” Vase. (2024)  The “Four Centuries” Vase by renowned artist Roberto Lugo (b. Philadelphia, PA, 1981) chronicles aspects of Black American history, from 1619 to the present. “Four Centuries” reimagines Union Porcelain Work’s seminal Century Vase, which was created for the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia and conveyed patriotism, nostalgia, and industrial progress through portraits of George Washington and white figures in vignettes about invention and agriculture. Lugo replaced the profiles of Washington with portraits of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Maryland-born Frederick Douglass and surrounded them with scenes that show enslavement, Jim Crow discrimination, the industrial prison complex, and Black Lives Matter protests, as well as scenes of urban vivacity. The work reflects Lugo’s commitment to centering Black and Brown histories.

Joyce J. Scott. Spring to Fall (Four Seasons). (c. 1990) and Cuddly Black Dick III. (1995)  Joyce J. Scott’s (b. Baltimore, MD, 1948) 50-year practice spans across fiber art, jewelry, performance, sculpture, printmaking, and installations. Spring to Fall (Four Seasons) (c. 1990) is among the most stunning known examples of Scott’s large-scale woven tapestries, constructed on her 11-foot cedar loom. It embodies the artist’s culminating aspirations as a fiber artist, capturing her compositional prowess as an experimental weaver. Cuddly Black Dick III (1995) is one of two known surviving examples from this 1995 series, which considers the Black penis as a culturally charged symbol, pointing out the danger and absurdity of reducing a person to a set of body parts. Both works were featured in the Joyce J. Scott: Walk a Mile in My Dreams retrospective co-organized by the BMA and the Seattle Art Museum.

Possibly studio, circle, or follower of Konstanin Kapidagli. Portrait of Sultan Abdulhamid I (r. 1774-89). (Early 19th century)  This powerful portrait is similar to those commissioned by Sultan Abdulhamid’s successor, Sultan Selim III, who hired Konstantin Kapidagli (Greek, working in the Ottoman Court, 1780s until about 1810) to produce a series of portraits of the Turkish Sultans. Kapidagli was important to advancing realism in Turkish painting and appreciated for his incredible skill. His portraits were copied as official gifts for foreign dignitaries and later in the 19th century for Ottoman genealogical trees. Sultan Abdulhamid I concluded the 1768-1774 war with Russia by signing a treaty ceding navigation and commercial privileges in the Ottoman Empire. Despite these failures, the Sultan was known as a pious and benevolent ruler.

Unidentified Women Artists. “Forget Me Not” Valentine. (c. 1885) This valentine composed of marine shells expands the BMA’s holdings of Caribbean artistic representation and women artists of color. It was created for tourists by women of African descent in Barbados, who enfranchised themselves post-emancipation by crafting handmade goods. Through its sentimental message, this souvenir object reflects an emotional component of 19th-century globalization. The intimate work can open and close and functions like a locket or greeting card. The sentiment, “Forget Me Not,” suggests a long distance or repeated parting from a loved one.

Dyani White Hawk (Sičánǧu Lakota). Carry IV. (2024) and Dreaming. (2022) Dyani White Hawk (b. Madison, WI, 1976) works across painting, bead working, sculpture, video, installation, and printmaking to reveal the underrecognized yet enduring influence of Indigenous aesthetics on modern and contemporary art. Carry IV (2024) was commissioned by the BMA for White Hawk’s solo exhibition Bodies of Water, and is part of the artist’s “Carry” series where she calls attention to and elevates objects rooted in function by adorning large copper buckets and ladles with glass beads and extravagantly long fringe that emulate arboreal root structures. This mesmerizing coil of fringe offers a visual effect of infinity, where the buckskin strands appear to continue without end, in recognition of the endless continuance of the artist’s Sičáŋǧu Lakota culture. The BMA also acquired White Hawk’s vibrant 18 color lithograph Dreaming (2022), published by Crow’s Shadow Institute of the Arts, a cultural center and artist’s residency dedicated to elevating Indigenous creativity and contemporary print making.

Billie Zangewa. Family Ties. (2021) Billie Zangewa (b. Blantyre, Malawi, 1973) creates intricate collages composed of hand-stitched fragments of raw silk in the form of vignettes and figurative compositions. Family Ties depicts a portrait of the artist and members of her family spread across six fragmented elements of collaged silk. Created on the heels of the pandemic, this work considers family, labor, and ritual, and also honors the legacies of the artist’s family as she considers her son’s origins. Zangewa will be the first named artist from Malawi to enter the BMA collection, expanding the museum’s holdings of southern and eastern African artists post-independence.