Suzanne Jackson. Somethings in the World

The exhibition—the first dedicated to the artist by a European museum institution—offers a glimpse of the research Suzanne Jackson has been carrying out for over fifty years, and retraces the key moments of her career.
Suzanne Jackson is an American artist whose practice embraces a broad field of investigation exploring the potential of painting, nourished by her experiences in dance, theater, and poetry. Her initial figurative production—populated by a pictorial matrix of characters, animals, and references to nature—evolved over the years, progressively approaching abstraction, until reaching the elaboration of a very personal vocabulary in which painting takes on both a sculptural and environmental dimension.

Somethings in the World stems from the idea of presenting the various stages of Jackson’s production by outlining the recurring elements, from her debut to her most recent oeuvre, through a careful selection of the most representative sets of works. The twenty-seven works on display, including iconic pieces, previously unseen works and her most recent production, creates a narrative that accompanies the visitor through the artist’s universe, at the same time triggering comparison and dialogue with the GAM setting and the permanent collection: from the sharp neoclassicism of Canova to the Divisionist paintings of Segantini, Previati, and Pellizza da Volpedo, as well as the extraordinary experiments in light and matter to be found in Medardo Rosso’s sculptures.

In Suzanne Jackson’s intentions, as reiterated in the title of this exhibition, her work must first and foremost render her experience “in” the world and “of” the world. In fact, the artist’s entire career is marked by phases closely related to biographical events, and that flow into one another, continually mixing and blending over the years: a constant interweaving of the private and personal dimension with the artistic and professional sphere, which the show recounts along an exhibition path constructed not chronologically but by associations and correspondences, underlining the links and continuous cross-references between themes, techniques, and languages.

From her dreamlike paintings of the 1970s to the radical experiments of her more recent “anti-canvases,”  which go so far as to do away with the need of a support, only to turn into pure color, the exhibition restores the complexity and the evolution of her investigation that has challenged and pushed the limits of paintings toward unexpected scenarios.

The Suzanne Jackson exhibition is the fifth edition of the Furla Series project, and is the upshot of collaboration between Fondazione Furla and GAM: a partnership begun in 2021 to promote annual exhibition projects providing a unique opportunity for past masters and protagonists of the contemporary scene to come face to face.

Furla Series is the project cycle that since 2017 has seen the Fondazione Furla engaged in the creation of exhibitions in collaboration with major Italian art institutions, with an all-female program designed to valorize and showcase women’s fundamental contribution to contemporary culture.

Suzanne Jackson

Suzanne Jackson (b. 1944; St. Louis, Missouri) lives and works in Savannah, Georgia. She grew up in the Yukon Territory, which only became a federal state of Alaska at the end of the 1950s, and upon reaching adulthood, moved to California where she studied art at San Francisco State University, and dance at the Pacific Ballet. In 1967 she moved to Los Angeles where she studied with Charles White and came into contact with the local artist community, including David Hammons, Timothy Washington, Alonzo Davis, Dan Concholar, Senga Nengudi, Gloria Bohanon, Betye Saar, and Emory Douglas. In 1968, she opened an art gallery in her studio, Gallery 32, which over just two years became a major reference point for the underground art scene, exhibiting the artists she was associated with, and for the first time in Los Angeles an exhibition dedicated exclusively to women artists of color. In 1990, she received a master’s degree in theatre design from Yale University and in 1996 moved to Savannah, where she was a Professor of Painting at the Savannah College of Art and Design. Recent solo exhibitions include Suzanne Jackson: Listen’ N Home, The Arts Club of Chicago (2022) and Suzanne Jackson: Five Decades, Jepson Center/Telfair Museums, Savannah (2019). She has received prestigious prizes and awards, including the Jacob Lawrence Award, Academy of Arts and Letters, New York (2022); Anonymous Was A Woman, NYFA, New York (2021); NYFA Murray Reich Distinguished Artist Award, NYFA, New York (2020); and Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters & Sculptors Grant, New York (2019). She has participated in numerous group exhibitions, and her work is to be found in the permanent collections of major institutions such as: Museum of Modern Art, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Baltimore Museum; California African American Museum, Los Angeles; MCA San Diego; The Art Institute of Chicago; and the Buffalo AKG Art Museum. 

Thanks to   

Educational Program sponsored by  

With the support of 

Le attività sono realizzate grazie al contributo concesso dalla Direzione generale Educazione, ricerca e istituti culturali del Ministero della cultura

Cover photo by: Suzanne Jackson, In A Black Man's Garden, 1973. Courtesy of the artist and Ortuzar Projects, New York
Installation view of Furla Series - Suzanne Jackson. Somethings in the World, 2023. Ph: Andrea Rossetti / Héctor Chico, Courtesy Fondazione Furla