In 1981, leading conceptual artist Sol LeWitt (American, 1928–2007) was invited by the Fairmount Park Art Association to propose a public artwork for a site in Fairmount Park. Installed thirty years after its conception, Lines in Four Directions in Flowers is a work of monumental scale, made up of more than 7,000 plantings arranged in strategically configured rows.

Taking cues from the Dada movement and from the work of Swiss sculptor Alberto Giacometti, Cy Twombly (American, 1928– 2011) created poetic objects whose serene white surfaces and allusive forms seem to recall remote worlds of myth and the ancient past. After reaching an indisputable maturity in his early sculpture, created from 1946 to 1959, Twombly returned to working in three dimensions in the mid-1970s and continued to cast new works up until his passing in 2011.

Sean Scully’s paintings speak eloquently to the history of abstraction, engaging in a passionate conversation with the legacies of Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism while offering new models for the continuing role of nonfigurative art.

Photogravure, a printmaking process that combines elements of aquatint etching and photography, was a prized medium among artist-photographers of the late nineteenth century, who labored over their hand-pulled prints.

Starting from Scratch showcases more than seventy of the Museum’s finest etchings, demonstrating the ways in which some of history’s most famous artists have embraced the medium to create original and dynamic works of art.

Presented on the occasion of the artist’s ninetieth birthday, this installation brings together a selection of four works that span Ellsworth Kelly’s prolific oeuvre. One of the most prominent artists of the postwar period, Kelly is known for his explorations of contrasting formal relationships: flat color versus depth, shape, and scale.

All Dressed Up: Fashions for Children and Their Families focuses on clothing from the late eighteenth through mid-twentieth centuries, comparing and contrasting adults' apparel with children’s smaller styles.