The Phillips Collection Presents Out of Many: Reframing an American Art Collection
Examining the complexity of American Art and national identity across the 20th and 21st centuries.
WASHINGTON, DC—The Phillips Collection presents Out of Many: Reframing an American Art Collection, an exhibition rooted in the museum’s century-old collection. The exhibition embraces the concept of “many” as a fundamental value in understanding the diverse histories and narratives of art and culture in the United States. Bringing together approximately 75 works across painting, print, photography, sculpture, and mixed media spanning over a century, the exhibition celebrates and examines the beauty, complexity, and contradictions of the American experience through the lens of visual art. Out of Many will be on view from November 8, 2025, through February 15, 2026.
Grounded by highlights from The Phillips Collection’s holdings alongside significant loans from the Howard University Gallery of Art, The David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland, and the National Gallery of Art, among other institutions and galleries, the exhibition foregrounds a more expansive vision of American art. Out of Many connects a diverse constellation of stories about American identity, engaging themes of landscape, social life, place and abstraction, cultural memory and erasure, and the politics of representation through the works of both well-known figures and historically overlooked artists.
“The Phillips Collection has long been at the forefront of collecting and presenting modern and contemporary art of the United States,” says Vradenburg Director and CEO Jonathan P. Binstock. “Founder Duncan Phillips was passionate about using his ‘experiment station’ to champion artists who were bold, independent-minded, and explored innovative new directions in art. Out of Many builds on this legacy, continuing to expand our understanding of what American art has been and what it can be.”
The exhibition stems from the Seeing U.S. research initiative, a multi-year effort to recover voices and share more comprehensive histories within the museum’s permanent collection. “The field of American art has shifted dramatically, breaking away from exclusionary narratives to embrace a wider range of cultural perspectives,” says Dr. Adrienne L. Childs, Senior Consulting Curator at The Phillips Collection. “Out of Many reconsiders American art and builds a new story about how artists have imagined and depicted the peoples, cultures, landscapes, and histories of the United States.”
Coinciding with the 250th anniversary of the United States, this exhibition takes part in a nationwide reflection on the country’s evolving cultural and artistic identity. “This presentation considers the museum’s dynamic history of collecting art of the United States while featuring loans that help to expand and enrich the story of American art,” says Camille Brown, Associate Curator at The Phillips Collection.
To deepen its inquiry, The Phillips Collection has partnered with the Howard University Gallery of Art and The David C. Driskell Center, institutions that hold rich collections of African American art and have provided both critical loans and scholarly insight. These collaborations build on long-standing relationships and help ensure the exhibition reflects the full dynamism of American art history.
Out of Many follows in the tradition of Phillips exhibitions that have reassessed the museum’s collection, including Breaking it Down: Conversations from the Vault (2024), Seeing Differently: The Phillips Collects for a New Century (2021), and Made in the USA: American Masters from The Phillips Collection (2014).
ARTISTS
Benny Andrews
Milton Avery
Mary Lee Bendolph
Desmond Beach
Romare Bearden
Esther Bubley
Beverly Buchanan
Lex Brown
Marguerite Burgess
William Christenberry
Rush Baker IV
Glenn O. Coleman
Kevin Cole
Larry Cook
Ralston Crawford
Keith Crown
Richard Diebenkorn
Philip Guston
Nicholas Galanin
Morris Graves
David Hammons
Lyle Ashton Harris
Hugh Hayden
Stefan Hirsch
robin holder
David Hockney
William H. Johnson
John Kane
Karl Knaths
Jacob Lawrence
Val Lewton
Cynthia Littlefield
Simone Leigh
Doris Lee
Clarence John Laughlin
Aaron Maier-Carretero
Jeanine Michna-Bales
Grandma Moses
Archibald Motley Jr.
Patrick Oliphant
Kenzo Okada
Georgia O’Keeffe
Delilah W. Pierce
Horace Pippin
James Amos Porter
Elisabeth Poe
Jefferson Pinder
James Phillips
Peter L. Robinson Jr.
Susan Rothenberg
Rozeal. (formerly known as Iona Rozeal Browne)
Aaron Siskind
Ben Shahn
Wayne Thiebaud
Kara Walker
Brett Weston
Joyce Wellman
EXHIBITION SUPPORT
The exhibition is organized by The Phillips Collection.
Research for this project was made possible by the Terra Foundation for American Art.
The exhibition is made possible, in part, by the Linda Lichtenberg Kaplan Exhibition Fund.
Presented with the essential support of Altria Group, Barbara Brown and Robert Berish, and Daniel W. Hamilton.
With critical support from The Phillips Collection’s Exhibition Endowment Fund.
EXHIBITION CATALOGUE
Out of Many is accompanied by a richly illustrated publication featuring essays by the exhibition curators, Adrienne L. Childs and Camille Brown, as well as object entries by the Phillips’s staff and Exhibition Advisory Committee members, including Camille Brown, Adrienne L. Childs, Kathryn Coney-Ali, Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, Abby Eron, Raul Ferrera-Balanquet, Melanee Harvey, Tie Jojima, Renée Maurer, and Rebecca Shipman.
IMAGE GALLERY:
High-resolution press images are available upon request. Please contact Lauryn Cantrell, lcantrell@phillipscollection.org.
IMAGE: Keith Crown, Midwestern Illinois Land, 1971, Watercolor on paper, 30 x 22 3/4 in., The Phillips Collection, Washington, DC, Gift of Ray Kass, 1981.
ABOUT THE PHILLIPS COLLECTION
The Phillips Collection, America’s first museum of modern art, was founded in 1921. The museum houses one of the world’s most celebrated Impressionist and American modern art collections and continues to grow its collection with important contemporary voices. Its distinctive building combines extensive new galleries with the former home of its founder, Duncan Phillips. The Phillips’s impact spreads nationally and internationally through its diverse and experimental special exhibitions and events, including its award-winning education programs for educators, students, and adults; renowned Phillips Music series; and dynamic art and wellness and Phillips after 5 events. The Phillips Collection’s extensive community partnerships include Phillips@THEARC, the museum’s satellite campus in Southeast DC. The Phillips Collection is a private, non-government museum, supported primarily by donations.