Past Exhibitions

LIFE Magazine and the Power of Photography

October 9, 2022–January 16, 2023

Reconsidering the pictures we remember. Revealing the stories we don’t know.

Portraits of Leadership
Responses to the Obama Portraits

September 3–October 30, 2022

Get Tickets Included with General Admission Portraits from the community featuring leaders of all kinds What does leadership look like? In response to...

The Obama Portraits Tour

September 3–October 30, 2022

Get Tickets Timed-Entry Ticket Required The acclaimed portraits of President Barack Obama and Mrs. Michelle Obama come to the MFA on the final stop of...

The Stillness of Things
Photographs from the Lane Collection

August 27, 2022–February 27, 2023

This exhibition presents nearly 60 innovative photographs—all departures from the traditional still life—drawn from the MFA’s Lane Collection. Grouped...

Community Arts Initiative: Empowered Faces

June 3–October 24, 2022

“Empowered Faces” is a mixed-media mural that showcases young artists’ self-portraits through abstracted forms. Artist and educator Perla Mabel...

Philip Guston Now

May 1–September 11, 2022

Experience a retrospective of Philip Guston’s work, from Depression-era muralist and painter to contemporary master and voice for social justice.

Turner’s Modern World

March 27–July 10, 2022

See more than 100 paintings, watercolors, drawings, and sketchbooks by J. M. W. Turner, including the MFA’s own Turner painting Slave Ship.

Real Photo Postcards
Pictures from a Changing Nation

March 17–July 25, 2022

In 1903, at the height of the worldwide craze for postcards, the Eastman Kodak Company unveiled a new product: the postcard camera. The device exposed...

Dawoud Bey: Night Coming Tenderly, Black

February 2–November 13, 2022

Throughout his long career, American artist Dawoud Bey (b. 1953) has reimagined history by bringing untold stories to the forefront of his work. Best...

Tattoos in Japanese Prints

November 20, 2021–February 20, 2022

Some of the world’s most popular tattoo motifs trace back to early 19th-century Edo (modern Tokyo), where tattoo artists took inspiration from color...