10 Must See Art Exhibitions Opening or Closing in February 2025
Visit these Ten Exhibitions Before They Close
Happy February! As we celebrate the month of love, there’s no better way to spend time with someone special than with a museum date—just in time for Valentine’s Day. This month, we’re highlighting 10 must-see exhibitions, both opening and closing, that offer unforgettable experiences. From painting and sculpture to photography and film, these showcases span a variety of mediums and take place in both major institutions and hidden gems across the country. Don’t miss the chance to explore these incredible exhibitions and make art a part of your February plans!
Pop Forever, Tom Wesselmann &... at The Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris, France.
Closes February 24, 2025
The exhibition is centered around Tom Wesselmann (1931-2004), one of the leading figures of the movement, through a selection of 150 paintings and works of various materials. It also brings together 70 works by 35 artists of different generations and nationalities who share a "Pop" sensibility, ranging from its Dadaist roots to its contemporary extensions, from the 1920s to the present day. (Follow on Instagram)
Tom Wesselmann, Still Life #56, 1967-1969. Oil on canvas, 237.5 x 274.3 x 91.4 cm MAMAC - Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Nice | Artist credit: © Adagp, Paris, 2024 Photo credit: © Robert McKeever
2. Edges of Ailey at The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY.
Closes February 9, 2025
Edges of Ailey is the first large-scale museum exhibition to celebrate the life, dances, influences, and enduring legacy of visionary artist and choreographer Alvin Ailey (b. 1931, Rogers, Texas; d. 1989, New York, New York). This dynamic showcase—described as an “extravaganza” by curator Adrienne Edwards—brings together visual art, live performance, music, a range of archival materials, and a multi-screen video installation drawn from recordings of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT) repertory to explore the full range of Ailey’s personal and creative life. Sweeping holdings of rarely seen archives, including performance footage, recorded interviews, notebooks, letters, poems, short stories, choreographic notes, drawings, and performance programs and posters gathered from Ailey’s archives and others forge a vital throughline in the gallery. (Follow on Instagram)
Installation view of Alvin Ailey Posters
3. Narrative Wisdom and African Arts at The Saint Louis Art Museum, St. Louis, MO.
Closes February 16, 2025
Narrative Wisdom and African Arts brings together more than 150 works in a variety of media including sculptures, textiles, works on paper, photography, painting and time-based media created by artists from sub-Saharan Africa as well as contemporary African artists working globally. The exhibition considers how historic and contemporary works—ranging from the 13th to 21st centuries—facilitate, document, reinforce or critique narratives, such as leadership legitimacy, memory of place, prescriptions for healing and destiny, and enduring ancestral wisdoms. (Follow on Instagram)
Gosette Lubondo, Congolese, born 1993; “Imaginary Trip II, no. 3”, 2018; inkjet print; image: 19 5/8 × 29 1/2 inches sheet: 22 × 32 inches; Saint Louis Art Museum, The Helen Kornblum Fund for Women Photographers, and Gift of August A. Busch Jr., by exchange 40:2021; © Gosette Lubondo, work produced as part of the photographic residencies of the Museum of Quai Branly-Jacques Chirac
4. Cady Noland at Glenstone Museum, Potomac, MD.
Closes February 23, 2025
Developed in collaboration with the artist, this presentation will mark the first major survey by a U.S. museum of her decades-long career. The presentation at Glenstone will showcase iconic works spanning Noland’s career, from some of her earliest sculptures created in the late 1980s to recent pieces exhibited in 2023 at Gagosian Gallery’s 75th & Park location in New York. Most of the works on display are drawn from Glenstone’s collection. (Follow on Instagram)
Cady Noland, Tower of Terror, 1993 - 1994, cast aluminum stockade, bench, link chain, padlocks, key. © Cady Noland
5. Thomas D. Mangelsen at The Museum of Art – DeLand, DeLand, FL.
Opens February 8 - August 31, 2025
The Museum of Art – DeLand is proud to present Thomas D. Mangelsen – A Life in the Wild. Renowned American nature photographer Thomas D. Mangelsen has traveled throughout the natural world for nearly 50 years observing and photographing the Earth’s last great wild places. From polar bears in the Arctic to vast herds of game on the plains of Africa, from the deep jungles of South America to the tigers of India, to images revealing the diversity of wildlife in the American West, Mangelsen has captured rare moments and vast panoramas from all seven continents.
Thomas D. Mangelsen, Catch of the Day, Fujiflex Crystal Archive Print, 1988
6. Ed Ruscha: Paper at the Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, NE.
Closes February 23, 2025
Ed Ruscha: Paper includes drawings, prints, and photographs from the artist’s recent gift to the Museum. These works, produced over six decades, feature graphics, typefaces, and letterforms rendered in ink, acrylic, pencil, pastel, and gunpowder on paper. A celebration of the artist’s wry use of image and text, this exhibition also highlights his experimentation with diverse media and techniques. Ed Ruscha draws inspiration from familiar subjects, including roadside gas stations, consumer products, and commercial logos. Colloquial speech also fascinates him. Rhymes, puns, guttural sounds, and catchphrases are among his signature motifs. Transforming the seemingly mundane into the extraordinary, Ruscha offers a fresh perspective on American vernacular culture. (Follow on Instagram)
Ed Ruscha (American, b. 1937), Standard Station, 1966, 7-color screenprint, 25 5/8 × 40 in. (65.1 × 101.6 cm), Promised gift of Ed and Danna Ruscha, © Ed Ruscha, Photograph © Bill Ganzel, Ganzel Group Communications, Inc.
7. Christo and Jeanne-Claude Surrounded Islands Documentation Exhibition at NSU Fort Lauderdale Art Museum, Fort Lauderdale, FL.
Opens February 23, 2025
NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale is thrilled to announce that it is now “Home to Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s Surrounded Islands.” The museum will premiere its first exhibition of this transformative gift from the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Foundation in February 2025, which includes over 43 preparatory drawings and collages created by Christo, as well as photographs and photo murals, engineering surveys, environmental studies, permits, correspondence, original components such as sections of the pink fabric, scale models and other archival documents that trace the history of this project. (Follow on Instagram)
Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Surrounded Islands, Biscayne Bay, Greater Miami, Florida, 1980-83. Photo: Wolfgang Volz. Copyright: 2024 Christo and Jeanne-Claude Foundation
8. Great Rivers Biennial at CAM St. Louis, St. Louis, MO.
Closes February 9, 2025
For the 2024 Biennial, artists Saj Issa, Basil Kincaid, and Ronald Young have proposed exhibitions that involve ceramics, paintings, video, textiles, and sculptural assemblage. The three award winners were unanimously chosen in summer 2023 by a distinguished panel of independent jurors: Rita Gonzalez, Terri and Michael Smooke Curator and Department Head of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Jamillah James, Manilow Senior Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; and Caroline Kent, a Chicago-based artist and Assistant Professor of Painting at the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University. The jurors made the selection after visiting the studios of ten semifinalist artists who were chosen from a pool of 96 applicants. (Follow on Instagram)
Installation view, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis. (Photo. Izaiah Johnson)
These next two are both currently on view at The Dallas Museum of Art.
9. Frida: Beyond the Myth at The Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX.
Closes February 23, 2025
Composed of 60 works across media—paintings, drawings, prints, and photographs—the exhibition will explore the life of one of the 20th century’s most well-documented artists, who continues to elude our understanding of her as an individual. Taking a chronological approach, this exhibition will lift the veil of myth surrounding Kahlo by delving deeper into the defining moments of her life and how she embedded symbolic motifs in her self-portraits and still lifes to cryptically express her emotive reactions to major events. These works will be supplemented with photographs of Kahlo taken by the friends and fellow artists who knew her best, capturing the vulnerability and sensuality that still compel us today.
Self-Portrait with Loose Hair, 1947. Frida Kahlo. Oil on Masonite. Private Collection. © 2024 Banco de México Diego Rivera Frida Kahlo Museums Trust,
Mexico, D.F. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
10. Cecily Brown: Themes and Variations at The Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX.
Closes February 9, 2025
Cecily Brown: Themes and Variations is the first exhibition to fully explore the pioneering British-American artist's work through the lens of its groundbreaking reconfiguration of cultural politics. This major mid-career retrospective brings together nearly 30 large-scale paintings and drawings from across almost 30 years of Brown’s career, including two new works on paper that will be shared with the public for the first time. The exhibition offers a closer look at Brown’s practice, examining the way her work challenges art history’s traditional values and presents women as complex and fully realized authors and subjects. (Follow on Instagram)
We didn’t mean to go to sea, 2018. Cecily Brown. Oil on linen, 89 x 83 in. The Rachofsky Collection. © Cecily Brown. Photo: Genevieve Hanson
Enjoy the month of LOVE visiting these exhibitions.
As winter settles in, February offers the perfect opportunity to engage with art that sparks reflection and renewal. From thought-provoking paintings to innovative sculptures and striking photography, this month’s exhibitions invite you to slow down and see the world through a new lens. Whether you’re seeking inspiration, connection, or a moment of stillness, these shows remind us that creativity is always in season. Step into the galleries, explore fresh ideas, and let art transform the way you see the world.