NEW YORK CITY (August 2023): The Hispanic Society Museum & Library (HSM&L) – the primary institution dedicated to the preservation, study, understanding, exhibition and enjoyment of art and cultures of Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking countries and communities – announces its line-up of Fall exhibitions for 2023. On the heels of the reopening of its Main Building earlier this year, the HSM&L is will open three new exhibitions this season.
“Since the opening of our Main Building earlier this year, we have activated the newly renovated spaces of the HSM&L with an incredible roster of exhibitions,” says Guillaume Kientz, Director and CEO of the Hispanic Society Museum & Library. “Now, as we gear up for the Fall season, we look forward to continuing to shine a light on and share our vast collections with the public with an exciting line-up of exhibitions.”

2023 Fall exhibitions at The Hispanic Museum & Library include the following:

Orange Cube 48 by Marta Chilindron
July 23 – October 31, 2023

The Hispanic Society Museum & Library and Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance (NoMAA), are pleased to unveil Marta Chilindron’s Orange Cube 48, installed on the HSM&L’s Lower Terrace in New York City under the direction of Orlando Hernandez-Ying, a curatorial associate at the HSM&L who serves as the in-house curator of this project. Chilindron, an Argentinean- born, New York-based contemporary artist, is the 2023 winner of the HSM&L and NoMAA’s open call for artists to create a summer outdoor installation on the Audubon Terrace (Broadway between 155th and 156th streets).
Orange Cube 48 is a folding immersive sculpture made of 66 square panels, measuring 48 x 48 in. (122 x 122 cm.), of translucent 3/8 in. twin-wall polycarbonate, a lightweight material, hinged together like an accordion – that when folded closed, forms a perfect cube. The work transforms a space into a maze that one can enter and walk through, becoming a piece of folding architecture. It is an interactive sculpture that is also an environment, inviting the public to become part of the sculpture – surrounded and contained – as they navigate through it.

Anatomy of a Fresco: Drawings of José Clemente Orozco
September 15^th – November 19^th, 2023

Drawn from a recent, major donation from the private collection of Salma and Michael Wornick, Anatomy of a Fresco: Drawings of José Clemente Orozco from the Wornick Collection features a rare group of figurative sketches for portraits and preparatory cartoons for large-scale murals made during the Mexican Mural Movement by one of ‘los tres grandes’, or ‘the big three’, José Clemente Orozco. This exhibition offers visitors the unique opportunity for the close study of the fresco-making process with large-scale digital reproductions of the final murals. Co-curated by Dr. Orlando Hernández-Ying and Dr. Niria E. Leyva-Gutiérrez, this show brings to the forefront the important social & political issues of post-Revolutionary Mexico that inform contemporary practices of muralism as a societal commentary.

A Collection without Borders: Highlights from the Permanent Collection
September 15^th, 2023 – March 30^th, 2024

 The Hispanic Society Museum & Library constitutes the most extensive resource about Hispanic art and literature conserved in one single place. As a result, its collection covers a wide scope of periods, cultures, and mediums, ranging from the Paleolithic to the 21st century, and comprising paintings, drawings, sculptures, decorative arts, prints, jewels, and textile. A Collection Without Borders will showcase a selection of its finest, most representative pieces, coming from different continents, featuring various techniques at the crossroads of multiple influences, eloquent -and sometimes puzzling- testimonies of an interconnected, global world.
Visitors will enjoy reconnecting with famous Spanish paintings by El Greco (1541-1614), Diego Velazquez (1599-1660), Francisco de Zurbaran (1598-1164), Bartolome Esteban Murillo (1617-1682), Francisco de Goya y Lucientes (1746-1828), and Antoni Tapies (1923-2012), as well as artists from or active in Latin America or the Philippines such as Baltasar Echave Ibia (c.1583 – c.1650), Agustin Arrieta (1803-1874), Miguel Vila Viladrich (1887-1956),  and Fernando Zobel (1924-1984). The exhibition will also include highlights from the museum’s robust decorative arts and sculpture collection. Some of the artworks, longtime holdings or most recent acquisitions, will be on public display for the first time, exploring new narratives and shedding light on formerly overlooked material or artists.

Picasso and the Spanish Classics
November 2^nd, 2023 – February 4^th, 2024

2023 marks the 50th anniversary of Pablo Picasso’s death. The Picasso Celebration 1973-2023 will involve around 50 exhibitions and events across Europe and North America, showcasing Picasso’s work and his artistic legacy. One of these exhibitions, Picasso and the Spanish Classics, will be held at the Hispanic Society Museum & Library, curated by Dr. Patrick Lenaghan, Curator at the HHSM&L. It will explore Picasso’s response to Spanish literature, in particular his images inspired by two 17th-century literary giants, Luis de Góngora y Argote and Miguel de Cervantes. Featuring a recent acquisition, Picasso’s suite of prints, Góngora’s Vingt poëmes (1948), it will display rarely seen works of art alongside seventeenth-century editions and manuscripts. It will highlight Picasso’s reinterpretation of Velázquez’s portrait of the poet, the artist’s vision of the ideal woman, and his depiction of the iconic figures from Cervantes’s novel Don Quixote. The exhibition will thus focus on the way Picasso reinterpreted the literary classics of his native land.

If interested in learning more about the HSM&L and the 2023-2024 calendar, please visit Hispanic Society Museum & Library and follow the institution on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

ABOUT THE HISPANIC SOCIETY MUSEUM & LIBRARY

The Hispanic Society Museum & Library (HSM&L) is the primary institution and reference library dedicated solely to the preservation, study, understanding, exhibition and enjoyment of art and cultures of Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking countries and communities. Located in Upper Manhattan in the dynamic Washington Heights neighborhood, the institution has, since its inception, remained free of charge, providing unrivaled access to the most extensive collection of Hispanic art and literature outside of Spain and Latin America.

The HSM&L’s permanent collection is unparalleled in its scope and quality, with half a million items that address nearly every aspect of cultures in Spain, Portugal and Latin America from antiquity to present day. HSM&L is unmatched in the multi-disciplinarity and broad historical and geographical extension of its art collection and library, highlighting Hispanic art and cultures’ incredible breadth as seen through its diverse religious, cultural and geographical influences. The collection includes masterworks by El Greco, Velázquez, Rodríguez Juárez, Goya, Campeche, Arrieta, Sorolla, Orozco and Tàpies; sculptures by Pedro de Mena, Luisa Roldán and Caspicara and masterpieces in all areas of the decorative arts. The collections of the Department of Manuscripts and Rare Books are among the most extensive outside Spain and the Library is available as a preeminent center for research on the history, art, and cultures of the Hispanic world. It is open to the public by appointment.

Founded in 1904 by American scholar, philanthropist and collector Archer M. Huntington, the HSM&L was established on the premise of a passion and curiosity for Hispanic and Latin American art, cultures and history. While the HSM&L is one of the most historic cultural institutions in New York City, the organization has continued to adapt and serve the local community and growing Hispanic and Latino populations in the United States at large, opening its doors to inspire, enrich and educate the public.

Under the stewardship of CEO and Director Guillaume Kientz and in the spirit of inclusivity, HSM&L makes a fervent commitment to give voice to and provide space for Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking communities and cultures. Through special exhibitions, a permanent collection, loans, education, support of living artists, public programming and research, HSM&L continues to reimagine the potential for a museum and its ability to incite greater change.