EXHIBITION: ​​New Age, New Age: Strategies for Survival

April 25 – August 11, 2019
DePaul Art Museum
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​​New Age, New Age: Strategies for Survival is an exhibition of work from the last fifteen years by contemporary artists who appropriate, critique, or embrace “New Age” aesthetics and concerns from a 21st century perspective. Emerging in the 1960s and 1970s against a backdrop of war, social strife and a crisis of modernity, the multifaceted New Age “movement” was characterized by alternative approaches to traditional Western culture, with an interest in spirituality, mysticism, holism, and environmentalism. It embodied a complicated conflation of politics, religion, science, social communities, art, music, and self-realization. Often dismissed for its association with drugged out hippies or flower-power children, how can New Age philosophies and practices be reconsidered today as relevant movement for social change and wellness?

Artists include:
Maikoiyo Alley-Barnes, Lise Haller Baggesen, Alun Be, Elijah Burgher, D. Denenge Duyst-Akpem, Whit Forrester, Desirée Holman, Cathy Hsiao, Michiko Itatani, Rashid Johnson, Marva Lee Pitchford-Jolly, Jenny Kendler, Liz Magic Laser, Matt Morris, Shana Moulton, Heidi Norton, Tony Oursler, Mai-Thu Perret, Robert Pruitt, Bob Ross, Luis A. Sahagun, Mindy Rose Schwartz, Suzanne Treister, Rhonda Wheatley, Megan Whitmarsh and Jade Gordon, Saya Woolfalk​

As ancient practices and rituals such as crystals, astrology, tarot cards, yoga, and meditation become both trendy commodities and necessary tools for self-care in an increasingly anxious world, how are they reflected in contemporary art making? Where does “New Age” intersect with curandera, Asian, indigenous, and Afro-futurist practices? The exhibition presents works organized within broad themes associated with New Age culture including metaphysical practices, a return to craft and handmade objects, connecting with the natural environment, and imagined communes with a special focus on how women, LGBTQ artists, and people of color use these alternative practices as tools of resistance, empowerment, community, healing, and self-care.

Curated by Julie Rodrigues Widholm, DPAM Director and Chief Curator.​​