PHILADELPHIA, PA.- The Philadelphia Museum of Art is presenting What Times are These?, an exhibition exploring art and the economy of language in times of crisis.

Bringing together sculptures, installations, films, paintings and prints, this show is entirely comprised of works from the PMA’s collection, several of which are presented for the first time. The artists included each use poetic ways to probe the state of our nations without asserting a fixed political view; among them, Nick Cassway, Lonnie Holley, Jenny Holzer, Glenn Ligon, and Steve McQueen.

Borrowing its title from Paul Celan’s 1971 poem, ‘A Leaf, Treeless’, the exhibition questions the function of language when speech itself has become fraught. The poem resonates with each of the works on view, asking: when do we have a political responsibility to speak—and how might we do so in a way that engages rather than inflames our adversaries?

What Times are These? opens with Jenny Holzer’s 1981 work, It Takes…, created at a moment when there was an injection of new wealth into Wall Street. The work relates to those hurt most by the burgeoning affluence in American cities, with a simple statement etched onto metal, which reads: “It takes awhile before you can step over inert bodies and go ahead with what you were trying to do.” Nearby, Philadelphia-based artist Jan Yager’s American Ruff from the City Flora/City Flotsam series (2000), made using the unsettling detritus of crack vials, speaks to the deprivation faced by many, which is suppressed by developers wanting to drive forward gentrification in metropolitan areas.

A wallpaper work by Nick Cassway, another Philadelphia-based artist, guides visitors through the rest of the exhibition, illustrating a couple engaged in a tense argument. In preparation for the work, Cassway hired actors and filmed a series of charged encounters: is the duo arguing about household chores, or perhaps political candidates? Elsewhere Glenn Ligon’s Untitled (I’m Turning into a Specter before Your Very Eyes and I’m Going to Haunt You) from 1992 features words from Jean Genet’s 1958 play, The Blacks: A Clown Show. The play was intended to cross-examine racial prejudice, with Black actors playing certain characters in whiteface. A 1992 installation by Felix Gonzalez-Torres is displayed alongside, making use of a simple string of lights to suggest the brightness and darkness that can follow the death of a loved one. Created shortly after the artist’s lover Ross Laycock died from AIDS-related complications, the sculpture touches upon aspects of grief and social stigma that are not easy to articulate in words.

What Times are These? continues with Pauline Boudry’s and Renate Lorenz’s 2016 film, Silent. Running on a loop, the work depicts the Venezuelan vocalist Aérea Negrot performing the musical score of John Cage’s notorious work, 4’33” (1952). Negrot makes small gestures—straightening her dress, puffing cigarette smoke— which confirm Cage’s idea that there is no such thing as silence, as we are all, always, accompanied by the music of incidental noise. The site of this performance is Oranienplatz in Berlin, where protests were staged between 2012 and 2014 against the mistreatment of refugees. As she breaks out into a song addressed to “Mr. President,” visitors might consider the ways in which their lives have been shaped by political leaders and the power of music, “silent” and otherwise, to ignite a renewed sense of agency.

The exhibition concludes in the PMA’s Great Stair Hall with the installation of Steve McQueen’s work, Static (2009). Shot on 35mm film from a helicopter, the work was made possible by President Obama’s reopening of the Statue of Liberty following its 8-year closure post-9/11. Running on a seven-minute loop, the work is displayed in front of the museum’s famous Diana sculpture, bringing the Roman goddess’s body into dialogue with that of Lady Liberty.

Each of the works in What Times are These? offers a political, and often playful, account of what it means to be a citizen today, celebrating the potential of art to articulate the unspeakable, especially within a climate of intense scrutiny. It coincides with the PMA’s major Fall exhibition, The Time is Always Now: Artists Reframe the Black Figure, drawing parallels between stories of representation and the complex social and cultural contexts in which artworks are created.

What Times are These? is curated by Eleanor Nairne, the PMA’s Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Curator and Head of Modern and Contemporary Art. In alphabetical order, the exhibition includes works by Dawoud Bey (b. 1953, USA), Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz (Switzerland), Nick Cassway (b. 1968, USA), William Nelson Copley (1919–1996), Felix Gonzalez-Torres (1957–1996), Lonnie Holley (b. 1950, USA), Jenny Holzer (b. 1950, USA), Glenn Ligon (b. 1960, USA), Steve McQueen (b. 1969, UK), Ad Reinhardt (1913–1967), Jan Yager (b. 1951, USA) and Zarina (1937 – 2020).