Current and Past Art Shows | Arnold Arboretum

Our art shows are offered in-person at the Hunnewell Building at 125 Arborway (open noon–4pm, Friday through Monday) and virtually on this page.

Artists interested in mounting solo exhibitions in the Hunnewell Building Lecture Hall should review the exhibition guidelines [pdf]. Proposals may be submitted to arbweb@arnarb.harvard.edu with the subject heading “Exhibition Proposal.”

Meaningful Beauty: The Vibrant Vocabulary of Honeysuckles

"Spring 2022 - Summer 2022"

The exhibition, Meaningful Beauty: The Vibrant Vocabulary of Honeysuckles, celebrates the diversity of honeysuckles, and explores how differences in form allow various species of the plant to effectively communicate with their environment. Through a blend of artistic and scientific imagery—including illustration, animation, photography, maps, and diagrams—the exhibition conveys key concepts in evolution and plant form. The exhibition further engages visitors of all ages through digital and interactive technology, including projection, kiosks, as well as extensive use of augmented reality to blend art with science and personalize the experience for each visitor.

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Stoneroot Epistle

Spring 2022 - Summer 2022

Collage and Words in Conversation is a superb definition of our current show in the Hunnnewell Visitor Center, Stoneroot Epistle. Poet Joyce Swagerty and her daughter, artist Daina Swagerty, collaborated to bring to the Arboretum this singular interpretation and articulation of the journey of a seed—an acorn—traveling though life.

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seeds for tomorrow: woody plants of the arnold arboretum, hidden worlds: a new herbarium, growth spurts, knobs, and knuckles: an environment of trees by lizi brown, a walk in the arboretum: digital photo collages by amy ragus, look again: seeing nature through a different set of eyes, online exhibition: arboretum haiku & you, over time: through art, the impact of change in the arboretum landscape, resilience: art in the time of covid-19, if winter comes…, urban ponds: essential ecosystem for the enjoyment and discovery of nature,

Seeds for Tomorrow: Woody Plants of the Arnold Arboretum

Winter 2022 - Spring 2022

Laura Fantini uses colored pencil to render seeds in exquisite, hyper-realistic drawings. This series is called “Hope,” and therein lies the power of seeds. They are emblematic of both birth and growth—small, complicated, and extraordinary, like the wonderful drawings in this exhibition.Laura Fantini uses colored pencil to render seeds in exquisite, hyper-realistic drawings. This series is called “Hope,” and therein lies the power of seeds. They are emblematic of both birth and growth—small, complicated, and extraordinary, like the wonderful drawings in this exhibition.

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Hidden Worlds: A New Herbarium

Fall 2021 - Winter 2022

Artist Madge Evers brings us into the world of nature, re-imagining the connection of fungi with plants through intimate, dreamlike landscapes. Her prints are animate worlds, revealing where mushroom spores and leaves intersect.Madge Evers brings her rich, layered spore prints to the aptly named exhibition, Hidden Worlds. Taking cues from nature's abundant examples of the interrelationship between fungi and plants, Evers creates A New Herbarium teeming with the synergy of organic life and her own creative discipline and vision.

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Growth Spurts, Knobs, and Knuckles: An Environment of Trees by Lizi Brown

Summer 2021 - Fall 2021

Artist Lizi Brown details tree trunks in ink and paint, creating patterns in light and dark on paper panels. Her concern for the trees, their lives caught in climate shifts, is recorded with fluidity and simple rendering.Artist Lizi Brown brings us a literal Environment of Trees in this exhibition of her paintings. Fluid renderings in ink and paint on construction paper show how the events and seasons have had a lasting influence on a tree’s aspect and structure. Brown's intense connection with trees becomes an exuberant and sensitive record of each tree's intimate life.

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A Walk in the Arboretum: Digital Photo Collages by Amy Ragus

Spring 2021 - Summer 2021

Photographer Amy Ragus specializes in multiple frame images of New England landscapes—digital photocollages. Important to the artist are discoveries she finds just off a road or path, as well as the people who share this space and enjoy nature throughout the seasons.

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Look Again: Seeing Nature through a Different Set of Eyes

Photographs by Joel Kershner

Spring 2021

Arnold Arboretum Field Guide volunteer Joel Kershner brings his creative mind's eye to a virtual show of images, aiming his camera at aspects of nature that we might miss in our own everyday wanderings.

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Online Exhibition: Arboretum Haiku & You

Images shared by participating haiku poets with their nature-inspired haikus.

2020

Take your own haiku hike in the outdoors, write a haiku about what you experience, and send it to the Arnold Arboretum to be a part of a special online exhibit! Check our Arboretum Haiku and You webpage, share expressions about the natural world through photography and this wonderful and creative form of poetry.

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Over Time: Through Art, the Impact of Change in the Arboretum Landscape

Monotype Paintings by Ginny Zanger

Winter 2021 - Spring 2021

The ethereal quality of Ginny Zanger’s artwork brings organic and exuberant life to images in this exhibition. Zanger works in watercolor and a technique she developed that she calls monotype painting—paint appears to float over and under surfaces, always with a focus in nature.

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Resilience: Art in the Time of COVID-19

Art of the Arboretum by Lois Cremmins

Winter 2020 - Winter 2021

Lois Cremmins found a sense of calm walking in the Arboretum, and it become a spiritual outlet and artistic focus during this exceptional year. This virtual show offers viewers a similar experience of calm and uplift in the contemplation of nature.

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If Winter Comes…

The Promise of Each Year in the Paintings of Anthony Apesos

Fall 2020 - Winter 2021

Tony Apesos’s oils open our eyes to the changes winter brings to plants and places—the flat meadows, rocky slopes, ponds, or intimate copses of the Arnold Arboretum. His art is alive and jubilant in its expression and astute rendering of the spirit within the season of winter.

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Urban Ponds: Essential Ecosystem for the Enjoyment and Discovery of Nature

Photographs by Bruce Wilson

Summer 2020 - Fall 2020

Aesthetic and elemental properties of water come into view in the three ponds in the Bradley Rosaceous Collection. Wilson’s images, like the ponds, are alive with fauna and flora, beckoning visitors who relish a connection to nature and water in an urban community.

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