MMA ANNOUNCES FALL EXHIBITIONS

September 23, 2022

artwork created by Jamal Cyrus
Jamal Cyrus, The Black Messiah, Live at the Troubadour , 2008 Private Collection Image c ourtesy of the Artist and Inman Gallery, H
Credit: Image courtesy of the Artist and Inman Gallery, Houston

Jamal Cyrus: The End of My Beginning, the first museum survey of celebrated Houston-born artist Jamal Cyrus, opens October 29, 2022 through March 5, 2023. The exhibition spans 15 formative years of Cyrus’s multidisciplinary practice from 2005 to 2020, assembling over 50 artworks including drawings, prints, paintings, works on both paper and papyrus, as well as sculpture, textiles, installation, and performance. MMA is the final venue of the exhibition tour. It was previously on view at the Blaffer Art Museum in Houston (the exhibition organizer) and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.

Also opening October 29, Maude Schuyler Clay: Portraits of a Place, an exhibition of nearly 100 photographic works by the artist from the early 1980s to the present. The collection includes intimate family portraits, still-life images of fruit, haunting landscapes, and glass plate images taken by Clay’s grandfather, Joseph Albert May. Judge May was a photo hobbyist and influence on Clay’s career. The glass plates shown for the first time in an exhibition document the agrarian lifestyle of the 1920’s Mississippi Delta. Portraits of a Place will also feature select images of Clay’s Highway Memorial Series.

A fifth generation Mississippian, Clay records local history as a visual archivist, capturing domestic, agricultural, and civic subjects unique to the Mississippi Delta—a section of the state known for an array of cultural traditions unique to Mississippi. The images are drawn from Clay's personal collection of her black-and-white and color photographs. The exhibition is organized by MMA guest curator Phoenix Savage, Associate Professor of Art at Tougaloo College and visiting Professor of Art at Brown University and long-time friend of Clay’s. The coordinating curator is Ryan N. Dennis (she/her), MMA Chief Curator and Artistic Director of the Museum’s Center for Art & Public Exchange.Both exhibitions will be accompanied by a roster of public programs. For more information, visit msmuseumart.org.

Opening Hours: Tuesday – Saturday: 11 AM – 5 PM, Sunday: 1 PM – 5 PM. Admission Prices: $15 Adults, $13 Seniors (65+),$10 Youth* (ages 5-17) and College Students (with ID.) Free for Members. Free for children ages 5 and under.

*Free for K-12 students on Tuesdays thanks to Feild Co-Operative Association and Thursdays thanks to Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi.