On This Ground: Being and Belonging in America

The Putnam Galleries of Native American and American art explore how art can help us understand what it means to belong to family, community, and this place we now call America. 

Bringing two extraordinary collections together for the first time in our institution's history, this long-term installation celebrates artistic achievements across time, space, and worldviews. 

The 250 artworks on display span in time from 10,000 years ago to the present, and demonstrate a range of voices, modes of expression, cultures, and media including: sculpture, paintings, textiles and costumes, furniture, decorative arts, works on paper, installations, video, and a re-envisioned period room. 

The installation will be responsive to these urgent times by giving our public an opportunity to grapple with the links, continuities, and disjunctions of our complex histories in America in order to shape a more connected and empathetic present and future.​

Credit: Overview from museum website