The 59th Carnegie International, titled “If the word we,” opens at the Carnegie Museum of Art on May 2. The Oakland museum released the full list of 61 artists and collectives in the eight-month-long exhibition.
This International includes 36 pieces commissioned for the exhibition and its publication.
“It’s fast approaching. Our team is working very hard. We’ve begun the installation process,” said Eric Crosby, the Henry J. Heinz II Director of the Carnegie Museum of Art, at a media event on Wednesday.
In November, the museum announced 14 select artist commissions for the International.
The voices included in this exhibition are from all corners of the globe, from India to Peru to Ghana to Canada to South Korea and beyond, as well as artists from the United States. They include Hans Ragnar Mathisen of Norway; Beatriz González of Colombia; and Sara Ndele of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The Carnegie International is an exhibition of contemporary art from around the globe. The first International opened in 1896 at the direction of Andrew Carnegie himself.
“He believed that art should be an educational resource, that it should be contemporary, international and accessible,” Crosby said. “He traveled to Venice for the first Venice Biennale and was convinced he must do the very same thing here in Pittsburgh.”
The previous Carnegie International ran from September 2022 to April 2023.
This year’s exhibition will not only encompass artists and collectives from around the world, it will also venture outside of the museum with activations in four partner institutions: the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, the Mattress Factory contemporary art museum, the Kamin Science Center and the Thelma Lovette YMCA.
“One of our most visible expressions of this exhibition’s commitment to relationships is how the International extends beyond the walls of this site,” Crosby said.
Ryan Inouye, Danielle A. Jackson and Liz Park are the Kathe and Jim Patrinos Curators of the 59th International.
“We approach this International not by defining a single framework but by working closely with artists over time and listening very attentively, and following how their work moves across geographies, disciplines and different forms of knowledge,” Park said. “Across our exhibition, artists are engaging in many different ways of being in practice that are deeply felt and spacially expansive.”
Park noted that the exhibition will move fluidly through different mediums such as painting, photography, sculpture, installation art, sound, performance and more.
Inouye, curator of international art at the Carnegie Museum of Art, was an associate curator of the previous Carnegie International. Park is the Richard Armstrong Curator of Contemporary Art at the Carnegie Museum of Art. Jackson is curator at Artists Space in New York City.
The 59th International’s title — “If the word we” — was chosen from a commissioned catalog essay by Haytham el-Wardany, an Egyptian-born writer who is a partner with this year’s International.
“Rather than understanding the word ‘we’ as a fixed or unified collective, the title proposes it as something much more dynamic,” Park said. “As a space for listening. The idea of ‘we’ as a subject and formation speaks to our curatorial methodology.”
Throughout the eight-month run of the 59th International — which will close Jan. 3, 2027 — there will be several “swells” of activity around the exhibition. They include the opening weekend in May, a period in mid-August and the period from Oct. 31 to Nov. 2. Each of these “swells” will be marked by special performances and programming that will invite audiences to visit — or return to — the International.
“ ‘If the word we’ is less a theme than it is an invitation,” Park said. “It’s an invitation to consider how collective life and culture are shaped through listening, through relationships and our shared responsibility. It is also an invitation to see how a museum might hold space for that work to unfold.”
Details on the 59th Carnegie International are on carnegieart.org.