The Philadelphia Museum of Art celebrates the acquisition of an outstanding masterpiece of early Renaissance armor: an exceedingly rare, fine, and complete horse armor and man armor, made in 1507 and about 1505 by the celebrated German armorers Wilhelm von Worms the Elder and Matthes Deutsch, respectively.

The diverse examples of contemporary special occasion and evening wear in this gallery, obtained through the auspices of Saks Fifth Avenue, are a welcome addition to the Museum’s outstanding collection of costume and textiles. These gifts showcase the individual designers’ creative flair and serve as a lasting tribute to the esteem and affection that Tom Marotta inspired.

Bruce Nauman: Topological Gardens is the official United States representation for the 53rd International Art Exhibition—La Biennale di Venezia. A three-part presentation in Venice, Italy, Topological Gardens exhibits works by Bruce Nauman in the U.S. Pavilion of the Biennale’s Giardini, as well as in spaces located on the premises of two of the most highly esteemed academic institutions in the city.

The first exhibition of Sommer’s work in Philadelphia since 1968, Frederick Sommer Photographs presents some forty images spanning the artist’s career, along with a small number of drawings and collages. Included is a rare suite of macabre yet poignant photographs the artist made in 1939 using chicken parts collected from his local butcher.

The Two Qalams explores the relationship between calligraphers and artists through five exemplary works of calligraphy, drawing, and painting dating from the seventeenth through nineteenth centuries.

This exhibition draws from the Museum’s extensive collections of modern art to place Gorky among European artists who inspired him, American artists whom he influenced, and expatriate Russian artists with whom he exhibited and worked while living in New York.

Common Ground examines a critical period for the art of photography and for the Philadelphia art scene. In the 1960s, photographers including Emmet Gowin, Will Larson, and Ray K. Metzker, among the first generation of photographers trained in university art departments, all came to Philadelphia to teach in the city’s renowned art schools, bringing with them experimental approaches to the medium.

In 1759, the young Josiah Wedgwood (1730–1795), who would become one of England’s most famous potters, established his first factory at the Ivy House Works in Burslem, England. A Purer Taste of Forms and Ornaments: Josiah Wedgwood and the Antique celebrates the 250th anniversary of this vastly influential factory and its extraordinary founder.

Artists have been inspired by the inner and outer beauty of the pomegranate since biblical times. The objects on view in this exhibition represent a cross-section of textiles from the Museum’s collection that feature this richly symbolic fruit.

Members of India’s elite have long been great patrons of both music and the visual arts. This exhibition explores some of the ways court artists have sought to create a bridge between these two rich artistic traditions, by translating the aural qualities of music into a visible form.

Today, Philadelphia is home to many emerging and established metalsmiths who teach, create, and exhibit their work here and elsewhere. On display in this gallery are pieces by several significant Philadelphians—Olaf Skoogfors, Stanley Lechtzin, Jan Yager, Bruce Metcalf, and Sharon Church, to name just a few—as well as recognized artists from around the country.

The collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Library and Archives have many notable associations with Arshile Gorky, ranging from books bequeathed to the Library by Alfred E. Gallatin (founder of New York University’s Gallery of Living Art, which Gorky frequently visited) to the papers of Julien Levy (Gorky’s New York art dealer). These documents, along with Library books and journals from other sources, provide a snapshot of what informed and inspired Arshile Gorky during his brief career and life.

Drawn from the Museum's collection, this exhibition features Korean screen paintings with auspicious Chinese narratives juxtaposed with the Chinese ceramics of the Qing dynasty (1616–1912) that are decorated with the similar themes.

This installation, drawn from the Museum’s permanent collection, brings together objects employed in the service and consumption of alcoholic beverages.

Jun Kaneko, born in Nagoya, Japan in 1942, began his formal studies in art in the United States at the Chouinard Art Institute and continued at Berkeley and Claremont Graduate School. These four sculptures represent a larger body of work called the Mission Clay Project, which created a total of forty-one new sculptures. This project took three years to complete.

The inaugural installation in the Museum's new Sculpture Garden, Isamu Noguchi at the Philadelphia Museum of Art is a fascinating selection of sculptures by an artist who had longstanding ties with the Museum and our late Director Anne d’Harnoncourt, and is represented in the collection by the extraordinary cast-bronze biomorphic Avatar.