RASHID JOHNSON, “Untitled Escape Collage,” 2018 (ceramic tile, mirror tile, branded red oak flooring, vinyl, spray enamel, oil stick, black soap, and wax, 97 × 121 × 2 1/4 inches / 246.4 × 307.3 × 5.7 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Martin Parsekian
A MAJOR TRAVELING SURVEY of Rashid Johnson will be on view at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York next spring. “Rashid Johnson: A Poem for Deep Thinkers” opens April 18, 2025. The exhibition is titled after a poem by Amiri Baraka (1934-2014), the poet, playwright, and activist who is a regular source of inspiration for the artist.
Over nearly three decades, Johnson has explored themes of race and masculinity, social alienation, anxiety, rebirth, and escapism. His largest exhibition to date, “A Poem for Deep Thinkers” will unfold throughout the grand rotunda of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed museum. Nearly 90 works will be on view across painting, mixed-media works, photography, video, film, and installation. Key bodies of work including The New Negro Escapist Social and Athletic Club, black-soap shelf paintings, shea butter installations, and Anxious Men and Broken Men series will be presented, along with the recent film “Sanguine,” which explores three generations of men in the artist’s family.
Born in Chicago and based in New York, Johnson served on the board of the Guggenheim from 2016-2023 and stepped down last year in advance of the exhibition announcement.
In a statement, Guggenheim Deputy Director and Chief Curator Naomi Beckwith said: “The Guggenheim could not be more thrilled to host this timely exhibition. Rashid Johnson is a master at synthesizing the key tendencies of twenty-first century art: the ability to move freely between different modes—painting, video, sculpture, performance—each a refined tool for forging a relationship between his own life history and art history. Above all, Johnson well understands that the vocation of the artist entails more than looking inwardly, it is also an opportunity to create, quite literally, platforms for the creative expression and self-care of others.” CT
“Rashid Johnson: A Poem for Deep Thinkers” is organized by Guggenheim Deputy Director and Chief Curator Naomi Beckwith and Andrea Karnes, chief curator at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, with Faith Hunter, a curatorial assistant at the Guggenheim. The exhibition will be on view at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, N.Y., from April 18, 2025–Jan. 18, 2026, before traveling to the Modern Art Museum Fort Worth in Fort Worth, Texas, in 2026, with additional venues expected to be confirmed
FIND MORE about Rashid Johnson on Instagram and at Hauser & Wirth gallery
Portrait of Rashid Johnson, New York, 2024. | Photo by Joshua Woods
RASHID JOHNSON, Detail of “Antoine’s Organ,” 2016 (steel, grow lights, plants, wood, shea butter, books, monitors, rugs, and piano, 189 × 338 × 126 3/4 inches / 480.1 × 858.5 × 322 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Stefan Altenburger
RASHID JOHNSON, “Seascape ‘Jitter Bug,’” 2022 (oil on linen, 72 × 96 1/8 × 1 11/16 inches / 182.9 × 244.1 × 4.3 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Stephanie Powell
RASHID JOHNSON, “Bruise Painting ‘It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue,’” 2021 (oil on linen, 95 7/8 × 157 3/4 × 2 1/2 inches / 243.5 × 400.7 × 6.4 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Stephanie Powell
RASHID JOHNSON, Detail of “Untitled (Shea Butter Table),” 2016 (shea butter, Persian rug, and branded walnut, 55 × 203 × 72 1/2 inches / 139.7 × 515.6 × 184.2 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Martin Parsekian
RASHID JOHNSON, “Untitled (Shea Butter Table),” 2016 (shea butter, Persian rug, and branded walnut, 55 × 203 × 72 1/2 inches / 139.7 × 515.6 × 184.2 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Martin Parsekian
RASHID JOHNSON, “Untitled Anxious Audience,” 2019 (ceramic tile, black soap, and wax, 159 × 180 × 3 inches / 403.9 × 457.2 × 7.6 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Martin Parsekian
RASHID JOHNSON, Detail of “Untitled Anxious Audience,” 2019 (ceramic tile, black soap, and wax, 159 × 180 × 3 inches / 403.9 × 457.2 × 7.6 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Martin Parsekian
RASHID JOHNSON, “Sanguine,” 2024 (color video with sound, transferred from 35 mm, 5 min., 52 sec., dimensions variable). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024
RASHID JOHNSON, Detail of “The Broken Five,” 2019 (ceramic tile, mirror tile, branded red oak flooring, vinyl, spray enamel, oil stick, black soap, and wax, 97 1/4 × 156 1/2 × 2 1/8 inches / 247 × 397.5 × 5.4 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Martin Parsekian
RASHID JOHNSON, “The Broken Five,” 2019 (ceramic tile, mirror tile, branded red oak flooring, vinyl, spray enamel, oil stick, black soap, and wax, 97 1/4 × 156 1/2 × 2 1/8 inches / 247 × 397.5 × 5.4 cm). | Image courtesy the artist © Rashid Johnson, 2024. Photo by Martin Parsekian
GALLERY EXHIBITION This fall, “Rashid Johnson: Anima” will be on view at Hauser & Wirth in Paris, France (Oct. 14-Dec. 21, 2024)
FIND MORE Rashid Johnson was profiled last year by GQ magazine and his art-filled homes in Manhattan and the Hamptons have been published in Architectural Digest, the New York Times, and the subject of a March 2024 cover story in T: The New York Times Style Magazine
BOOKSHELF
Forthcoming in 2025, a fully illustrated catalog, “Rashid Johnson: A Poem for Deep Thinkers,” will be published to coincide with the exhibition. The volume will featuree essays by Naomi Beckwith and Andrea Karnes, an interview with Johnson conducted by artist Odili Donald Odita, and additional text contributions by Kevin Quashie, Nana Adusei-Poku, Tiona Nekkia McClodden, and Hendrik Folkerts. A comprehensive exploration of the artist’s practice, “Rashid Johnson (Phaidon Contemporary Artists Series)” was released last year. “Rashid Johnson: Message to Our Folks” documented Johnson’s first solo museum exhibition a dozen years ago. Also consider, “Rashid Johnson: The Hikers,” a massive 440-page volume; “Rashid Johnson: New Works,” exploring his sculptural installations; and “Rashid Johnson: Anxious Men,” accompanying an exhibition at the Drawing Center in New York, where Johnson showed his Anxious Men works for the first time. Recently published, “Cheryl Johnson-Odim & Rashid Johnson: Heart-Turned-Inside-Out Poems” pairs Johnson’s artworks with his mother’s poetry along with a conversation between the two.
