Here at Tufts University Art Galleries (TUAG), our summer has been busy — for the first time in close to a decade, we opened our doors mid-summer — with Tomashi Jackson: Across the Universe on July 30 and Ulises: Assembly on August 13. We loved celebrating both exhibitions with our community last month, and now that autumn has arrived in earnest, we’re looking forward to a season of lectures, workshops, and performances ahead that mines the archives, deepens our understanding of the work of our exhibiting artists, and investigates the deep inequities of U.S. public policies. 

This month, we’re thrilled to partner with SMFA at Tufts for their Artist Talks series with Tomashi Jackson on October 4 and invite our community to join us at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston for the 2024 Leo and Betty Beckwith Lecture with pioneering multimedia artist American Artist on October 10. 

On October 5, Lizania Cruz will lead a workshop guiding participants on ways of questioning, recontextualizing, and creating new narratives based on a selection of the archive of her long-term project Investigation of the Dominican Racial Imaginary.

For our first panel discussion of the season on October 23, Tomashi Jackson, Nia K. Evans and Cierra Michele Peters from the Boston Ujima Project, Dean Dayna Cunningham, and TUAG Collections Manager Laura McDonald will explore the histories and legacies of abolitionist practices today. 

To close out October, join Limited Time Engagement (LTE, Kate Conlon and Boyang Hou) and Tufts University Art Galleries (TUAG) for Templates for Public Art, a publication of artist-designed jack-o-lantern templates published annually by Limited Time Engagement (LTE). The book is released each October at a carving party/exhibition where participants realize the artworks for public exhibition (as lit pumpkins).

Explore our full month of programming and register for these events below.

We’re so pleased to announce that Tomashi Jackson: Across the Universe is an Artforum Critics’ Pick! Read Helen Miller’s thoughtful deep dive into the world of this milestone exhibition here.

Thank you so much to Cate McQuaid at the Boston Globe for an incredible double-header on Across the Universe, a stunning studio feature shot by Jonathan Wiggs and a spotlight in her fabulous roundup of Boston area shows meeting our political moment. You can also read an extended interview on Jackson and Across the Universe on McQuaid’s Substack Ocean in a Drop.

Globe Art Critic Murray Whyte shouted out Across the Universe in The Ticket, the paper’s weekend roundup of the best of arts and culture in Boston, and Claire Ogden peeled apart the layers of this “dazzling midcareer retrospective" for Cambridge Day.

Stay up to date on all the latest coverage of our Fall 2024 season, learn more about upcoming programming, and take a look behind the scenes at TUAG on our Instagram.