COLUMBIA, SC.- The Columbia Museum of Art presents featured exhibition Body Matters, on view August 22, 2026, through January 3, 2027. Organized by the CMA, this exclusive exhibition explores the reciprocal relationship between craft objects and the people who make and use them. Opening day festivities include a Member Morning as well as an afternoon conversation between CMA Curator Sad Ayorinde and featured artist Judy Moonelis.
The human body is essential to craft. This genre of art is rooted in physical labor, tactile knowledge, and material intimacy, and the resulting pieces are often intended to protect bodies or to assist in nourishing them. Building on that foundation, this exhibition presents works made of such materials as wood, ceramics, glass, textiles, and sweetgrass, and foregrounds their bodily resonance in terms of method-making as well as subject matter.
The roughly 70 objects — drawn largely from the CMA Collection and bolstered with institutional loans — range from an Egyptian headrest (1650–1550 BCE) to a new museum acquisition, a mixed-media installation from artist Jordan Sheridan (b. 1989) created this year and specially commissioned for this exhibition. Other highlights include a video installation from David Cushway (b. 1966), ceramics from Judy Moonelis (b. 1953), and a blanket of quilted condoms from Drunell Levinson (b. 1951). The artists, both historical and contemporary, reveal their deep engagement with the body through figural representations and objects that address life cycles and support bodily functions. Likewise, they leave the marks of their own bodies through the labor of creation — the gestures (or lack thereof), repetitions, and physical engagement that shape each piece.
Body Matters celebrates the importance of the hand in handwork and encourages viewers to consider their own relationships with objects both inside and outside the galleries.
The exhibition is part of Handwork 2026, Craft in America’s nationwide semiquincentennial collaboration showcasing the importance of the handmade and celebrating the diversity of craft that defines America.
