Too Much Is Just Right
The Legacy of Pattern and Decoration
In the past 50 years in the United States and beyond, artists have sought to break down social and political hierarchies that include issues of identity, gender, power, race, authority, and authenticity. Unsurprisingly, these decades generated a reconsideration of the idea of pattern and decoration as a third option to figuration and abstraction in art. From 1972 to 1985, artists in the Pattern and Decoration movement worked to expand the visual vocabulary of contemporary art to include ethnically and culturally diverse options that eradicated the barriers between fine art and craft and questioned the dominant minimalist aesthetic. These artists did so by incorporating opulence and bold intricacies garnered from such wide-ranging inspirations as United States quilt-making and Islamic architecture.
Too Much Is Just Right: The Legacy of Pattern and Decoration features more than 70 artworks in an array of media from both the original time frame of the Pattern and Decoration movement, as well as contemporary artworks created between 1985 and the present. The artworks in this exhibition demonstrate the vibrant and varied approaches to pattern and decoration in art. Sections will explore the history of pattern and decoration’s use in American art during and after the now formally recognized movement was established. Artworks from the 21st century elucidate contemporary perspectives on the employment of pattern to inform visual vocabularies and investigations of diverse themes in the present day.
Artworks drawn from the Asheville Art Museum’s Collection join select major loans and feature Pattern and Decoration artists. The selected artists represent all media.
- Jackie Abrams
- Elizabeth Alexander
- Anni Albers
- Ramona Lossiah Baith
- Sanford Biggers
- Cynthia Bringle
- Tawny Chatmon
- José Chardiet
- Donald Clark
- Charles Clary
- Herb Cohen
- Margaret Curtis
- Patrick L. Dougherty
- Michael Eastman
- Pamela Echeverria
- Mary Engel
- Debra Fisher
- Cathy Fussell
- Julia Galloway
- John Geci
- Amy Gross
- Lorna Blaine Halper
- Samantha Henneke
- John Himmelfarb
- Robert Gordy
- Trista Hudzik
- Lisa Hunt
- Valerie Jaudon
- David Hunt Jernigan
- Joyce Kozloff
- Robert Kushner
- Nabil el Jaouhari
- Anne Lemanski
- Stephen Lloyd
- Becky Lloyd
- Nava Lubelski
- Roberto Lugo
- Peter Olson
- Alex MacLean
- Amber Marshall
- Rashaad Newsome
- Laura Peery
- Judy Pfaff
- Mark Peiser
- Corey Pemberton
- Howardena Pindell
- Liz Whitney Quisgard
- Martha Reed
- Don Reitz
- Beatrice Riese
- Deborah Roberts
- Warren Rosser
- Miriam Schapiro
- Joyce Scott
- Sarah Sense
- James Siena
- Michael Sherrill
- Sewell Sillman
- Sandy Skoglund
- Billie Ruth Sudduth
- Shoku Teruyama
- Mickalene Thomas
- Anna Valdez
- Lina Iris Viktor
- John Whitesell
- Marilyn Torre Whitesell
- Kehinde Wiley
- Marian Wolfe
This exhibition is organized by the Asheville Art Museum and guest curated by Marilyn Laufer & Tom Butler.
