Harriet Bart: Abracadabra and Other Forms of Protection

In February 2020, the Weisman Art Museum will present Harriet Bart: Abracadabra and Other Forms of Protection, the first retrospective and monograph devoted to Harriet Bart, a pioneering artist whose powerful and varied conceptual installations and national and international exhibitions have made unique creative contributions to contemporary American art.

Bart’s work addresses urgent contemporary issues: the devastations of war, the complexities of memorialization, the emotional dimensions of space, the gendering of labor. This exhibition reflects on art’s ability to protect and transform, to expand our capacity for empathy, and to sensitize us to histories we might otherwise forget.

This exhibition locates Bart—a co-founding member of the important feminist art collective the Women’s Art Registry of Minnesota—as a leading multidisciplinary, conceptual artist to emerge during the historic shifts in 1970s art.

Featuring approximately 100 objects, the exhibition includes fiber works, paintings, sculptures, prints, artists books, and multimedia installations. A newly commissioned installation that evokes the ancient Jewish tradition of geniza, the practice of safeguarding written texts that might otherwise be discarded, will also be featured.

Bart’s work represents movements that have inspired her: fiber art, feminism, Conceptualism, Minimalism, and Jewish mysticism. She distills the complex ideas and histories that inform her practice into spare, beautiful objects and installations that express a singular vision and originality. This exhibition locates Bart as a leading multidisciplinary, conceptual artist to emerge during the historic shifts in 1970s art.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website