Brancusi: The Artist and His Studio opens at the Museum of Modern Art on October 25 and runs through February 27, 2027. MoMA's exhibition announcement places the presentation across the sixth floor and brings sculpture together with furniture, bases, films, photographs, tools and archival material.
A sculpture’s support changes its height, apparent balance and relationship with the viewer. The studio material makes those arrangements part of the visit's subject.
Sculpture and the studio around it
Studio photographs preserve arrangements of sculptures, furniture and tools. They add the surroundings of Brancusi’s work to an exhibition in which the bases and supports are part of the subject.
The combination of objects and documents brings the work’s setting into view, alongside the finished sculptures.
Connections elsewhere at MoMA
MoMA has published a self-guided companion through its collection. It connects Brancusi's ideas with later artists and identifies works on Floors 5, 4 and 2. The guide provides an optional continuation beyond the exhibition.
The companion discusses Richard Serra's Equal in Gallery 210 and Haegue Yang's Sallim in Gallery 206. Those works extend the comparison into later sculpture and installations. Check the map and current display before crossing the building for a particular work.
The dimensions of Timidity show how much of a sculpture’s presence can come from its base. Its listing for Timidity identifies a limestone sculpture only 14 3/8 inches high, standing on two oak sections that bring the whole assembly to 63 9/16 inches. The support accounts for most of the height. The pedestal places a small carved form at a very different viewing height.
The same announcement identifies Exotic Plant as oak on a limestone base. Following that change of material offers a second comparison with Timidity's limestone above oak. The two works reverse the relationship between oak and limestone.
