The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) has acquired approximately 150 works that span culture, geography, and time. The new additions represent a vast array of voices from around the world, guided by the museum’s vision of global exchange while continuing to uplift artists with ties to Baltimore.
Among the newly acquired works, including art the BMA has either purchased or has been gifted or promised as a gift, are paintings by Thomas Hart Benton, Katherine Bradford, Manuel Felguérez, Helen Frankenthaler, Maia Cruz Palileo, Kaveri Raina, and María Josefa Sánchez. There are sculpture and mixed media works by Kelly Akashi, Ida Applebroog, Tracey Emin, Alicia Henry, and Roxy Paine, along with a video installation by Josh Kline.
The museum is also expecting textile and jewelry works by Baltimore icon Betty Cooke, Ansoumana Diédhiou, and Arline Fisch; and works on paper by Omar Ba, Paul Colin, Auguste Amant Constant Fidèle Edouart, Fathi Hassan, Marlon Mullen, Richard Pousette-Dart, Benjamin Roubaud, Henry Taylor, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and Uemura Shōen.
The BMA also continues to support artists creating new work and has acquired “Fire on the Mountain” (2025), a sculpture by Abigail Lucien (b. 1992) from a new body of work the BMA commissioned for the artist’s first solo museum presentation. Lucien is the 2023 winner of the Janet & Walter Sondheim Art Prize. The sculpture is on view now in the Contemporary Wing. It combines motifs of architecture, flora, and fauna into formally innovative relief sculpture.
The museum has also acquired “clouds XVI” (2024) by Kenturah Davis (b. 1984, Los Angeles, CA). The artist produced this work as part of the Sherman Family Foundation Residency in Maine, which is a program developed in partnership with the BMA. Inspired by clouds she observed during her residency there, she used indigo pigment rubbing and debossed text on Igarashi kozo paper to explore perception and materiality. Both “Fire on the Mountain” and “clouds XVI” are the artists’ first works to enter the BMA’s collection.
Other works by artists with Baltimore connections include a major freestanding sculpture called “Bale Variant No 0027 (Charm City Girl Stele)” (2022) by Shinique Smith (b. 1971, Baltimore, MD.) This is a gift from the artist, dedicated in memory of her grandparents. The work comprises bundled and bound garments, ribbon, and dyed fabric and functions as a monument, vessel, and archive of resilience and place-making. The title references Baltimore explicitly, centering the artist’s roots in her work and reinforcing her connection to local Black communities — especially Black women and girls.
Baltimore’s artistic depth and reach is further represented by works on paper by Mahtab Hussain, Joyce J. Scott, and Nicholas Wisniewski, as well as a genre-defying assemblage by Devin N. Morris.
“The acquisitions announced today reflect the BMA’s deeply intentional and concerted efforts to enhance our collection with new voices and to strengthen holdings of important genres, movements, and creative evolutions,” said Asma Naeem, the BMA’s Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director. “Our vision is to leverage our collection to tell a breadth of captivating stories about people, cultures, and the importance of art to nurturing and reflecting the human spirit. We look forward to bringing these new works into our galleries for the enjoyment of our audiences.”
Other BMA acquisition highlights include “Vase with scenes from the Maqamat al-Ḥarīrī,” c. 1900-1910, a black-lustered vase designed and painted at the Cantagalli factory—Italy’s most famous art nouveau ceramic factory; “Polygamie” (c. 1978), by Ansoumana Diédhiou 1949 – 2001, Senegal), a tapestry celebrating Senegalese elements of culture and history; “The Crucifixion or Cell Cross” (1641), by María Josefa Sánchez (active c. 1639 – 1652), a small painted cross depicting Jesus with great realism at the moment of his Crucifixion and rare example of a work by a Spanish woman artist from the early modern period, and many more.
The BMA is located at 10 Art Museum Drive, Baltimore, Maryland.
