Current & Upcoming

Unguarded: SUMMA 2020
Guest Curator: Stylo Starr, Hamilton-based artist and visual alchemist

Opens September 10, 2020

The McMaster Museum of Art is pleased to present the graduation exhibition of the McMaster BFA Class of 2020:

Sage Barker, Maria Basso-Jimenez, Jordan Blake, Caitlin Cino, Amanda Drinkwater, Kelsey Dykstra, Aislinn Farrell, Brittany Forrest, Dean Hossack, Celine Jeong, Sohyun Kim, Alexandra Roberts, Emily Roberts, Shveta Sharma, Sarah Urban, Jenna Wellman

Visit the Virtual exhibition now!

Over the past four years, this class of 16 individuals has come together to learn, create, and understand one another in both artistic and personal settings. They have supported each other as they delve into new directions in their respective practices, across a wide range of media from clay and paint to digital and sound art. Throughout, they have worked collaboratively to develop and curate exhibitions, notably the ambitious 2018 spring fashion show, Renovate My Body.

This exhibition presents the work of these emerging artists, artist talks and more and celebrates a major milestone.

Instruments of Exchange: Coins from Antiquity to Today
Curated by Dr. Spencer Pope
September 12, 2019 - August 23, 2021

CURATOR’S TALK | Spencer Pope: September 19, 12:30 – 1:20 pm
More exhibition information and the curator's talk recording here

Because they are instruments of economic exchange, coins contain richly detailed images that provide an assurance of their value. And because they are issued by a political authority, the images represent the community that produced and keep them in circulation. In this way, coins sit at the intersection of economic, political, and artistic interests. Coinage developed a visual language that spoke both to their value and their origin as early as the seventh century BCE. It remained a fundamentally conservative medium throughout antiquity and even beyond: their recognizability is part of their function. The visual language established in antiquity still governs many coins today, with the result that much of what circulates now is indebted to long-lived traditions. This exhibition will present coins from the McMaster Museum of Art and consider their role as instruments of exchange.

This exhibition has been postponed due to COVID-19 situation. We will update when further details are available.

Enawendewin / Relationships
curated by William Kingfisher
Summer 2021

An exhibition of work by:
Anong Migwans Beam
Carl Beam
Ron Benner
Susan Blight
Jenn Cole
David Deleary
Melissa General
Mike MacDonald
Lisa Myers

This exhibition brings together artists whose works convey the importance of relationality in nature by integrating Indigenous knowledge and language in the everyday. Themes include: understanding food production as politics, decolonization methods, and the interaction between local and global concerns. These works are about looking closely at the world and towards the future, considering gardens and our relationships to nature as sites of learning and creation.

Image: Melissa General, Reclamation. Image courtesy of the artist

There is a wealth of sculpture to be explored all across McMaster University campus. Find out the stories behind more than 25 of them via the McMaster Campus Sculpture Tour (website/app). This tour app and website begins at the Museum and guides you to a variety of campus treasures - inside and out of buildings.

Featured sculptures include those accessioned into the collection of the McMaster Museum of Art and those independently commissioned on campus.

Please see our Facebook Page events for updates about Guided Walking Tours led by the museum of art's education team.