Hessel Museum to Stage First US Survey of Baghdad Modern Art Group

The Hessel Museum of Art at Bard College will present 'All Manner of Experiments: Legacies of the Baghdad Modern Art Group' from June 21 to October 19, 2025. This is the first exhibition to historicize the Baghdad Modern Art Group, founded in 1951 and active through the early 1970s. Curated by Nada Shabout, Tiffany Floyd, and Lauren Cornell, the show features over 70 works including painting, sculpture, and drawing from 1946 to 2023, alongside archival materials such as the group's manifesto, newsreel footage, and posters. The Baghdad Modern Art Group, led by Jewad Selim and Shakir Hassan Al Said, sought inspiration from heritage ('Istilham al turath') to forge a modern Iraqi aesthetic blending Western abstraction with Islamic and Mesopotamian motifs. The exhibition traces the group's formation, its fragmentation after Selim's death in 1961, and its legacy through subsequent generations, including the New Vision Group (1969). Loans come from the Barjeel Art Foundation, Dalloul Art Foundation, Ibrahimi Collection, and Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art. Featured artists include Dia al-Azzawi, Ismail Fattah, Mohammed Ghani Hikmat, Hanaa Malallah, and Naziha Selim, among 36 total. The show reframes Iraqi art within global modernism, many works unseen since their initial exhibition.