Publication
Alison Knowles, Iliad Oddities (Greene Street), 2010. Found objects and cyanotype on cloth, 24 x 108 in. Courtesy Alison…
Alison Knowles, Iliad Oddities (Greene Street), 2010. Found objects and cyanotype on cloth, 24 x 108 in. Courtesy Alison Knowles Studio and James Fuentes, New York
Helen Frankenthaler, Making Music, 2000. Etching, aquatint, and mezzotint, artist proof I, 15 1/4 x 26 in. Helen…
Helen Frankenthaler, Making Music, 2000. Etching, aquatint, and mezzotint, artist proof I, 15 1/4 x 26 in. Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, New York. © 2026 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / Tyler Graphics Ltd., Mount Kisco, New York
Tuesday, September 8, 2026
at 6:00PM
Opening Reception | by Alison Knowles: A Retrospective (1960–2022) & Making Music: Helen Frankenthaler Prints from the NYU Art Collection
All are welcome—no RSVP required
Longform Content
Please join us for the opening reception for the exhibitions by Alison Knowles: A Retrospective (1960–2022) and Making Music: Helen Frankenthaler Prints from the New York University Art Collection
by Alison Knowles: A Retrospective (1960–2022) is the first comprehensive survey of work by American artist Alison Knowles (1933–2025), whose career spanned more than six decades. Based in New York, she maintained studios in Chelsea and SoHo and became central to the Downtown artistic community. While Knowles is often recognized as an important performance artist and member of Fluxus—an international community of experimental artists formed in the early 1960s—this exhibition refocuses attention on her pioneering individual production.
Join us outside the museum for Celebration Red (Homage to Each Red Thing), an event score “celebrating every red thing” created by Alison Knowles. Help us activate this evolving installation during the opening reception by placing a red item of your choosing on the red grid.
Remarks at 6: 30 PM
Making Music: Helen Frankenthaler Prints from the New York University Art Collection is the first exhibition to highlight the lifelong dialogue between sight and sound in Helen Frankenthaler’s art. Frankenthaler repeatedly turned to music as a source of inspiration, creative fellowship, and evocative titles for her works. From the jazz clubs of 1950s New York to the ballets and operas she frequented throughout her working life, the artist engaged with the performing arts as a devoted participant. The show features nine works selected primarily from a 2023 gift from the Foundation’s Prints Initiative, inviting a broader consideration of the role of music and the performing arts in Frankenthaler’s life and legacy.
Credits
by Alison Knowles. A Retrospective (1960–2022) is organized by the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA) and curated by Karen Moss. The exhibition is made possible through lead support from the Terra Foundation for American Art and from Dr. Rosalyn M. Laudati and Dr. James Pick. It is also supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
The presentation at the Grey Art Museum is made possible in part by generous support from the Charina Endowment Fund; the Ann B. Ritt Charitable Foundation; and the Abby Weed Grey Trust.
Making Music: Helen Frankenthaler Prints from the New York University Art Collection is organized by the Grey Art Museum, New York University, and curated by Saskia K. Verlaan, Head of Collections, and Tyler C. Spencer, Graduate Curatorial Assistant (2024–26). The exhibition is supported by the Frankenthaler Prints Initiative, a grantmaking program established by the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation in 2018 to enrich academic institutions’ collections and resources and promote scholarly research on Frankenthaler’s innovative contributions to the field of printmaking.
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