The Claremont Lewis Museum of Art Announces New Exhibitions for 2026

For Immediate Release

February 4, 2026

Press Contact: Catherine McIntosh

909 626-1386, cell 713 829-9338 cmcintosh1011@gmail.com

The Claremont Lewis Museum of Art has announced four new exhibitions set to open in 2026. The community is invited to visit the Museum regularly to discover new artworks, programs, and events throughout the year. The Museum is located in the historic Claremont Depot at 200 W. First Street. For more information visit clmoa.org.

APRIL 4 – JULY 12, 2026

Julian Lucas: Happiness Pursued. Paradise Lost.

In his first solo museum exhibition, Claremont-based photographer Julian Lucas explores the idea of home and its relationship to the American Dream as the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary in 2026. The exhibition theme is based on the assertion that home is a state of mind, and the American Dream is stratified in relationship to race and access to power.

Through multiple photographic series, Lucas offers intimate portraits while exploring the historical and socioeconomic forces shaping the lives of his subjects. In his Exodus series, Lucas documents the ongoing story of the Great Migration which began with black people fleeing the Jim Crow South. It is a story that affected the artist’s own family and continues for many, as unaffordable housing forces them to continue to migrate, to seemingly never put down roots.

Lucas’s Apt #31 project explores home in a more intimate context by documenting a family living in a one-bedroom apartment.

JULY 18, 2026

Free For All

Local artists will take over the Museum for CLMA’s third annual one-day pop-up exhibition from 2-9 pm. With no fees to exhibit and no gatekeepers to decide who is allowed to exhibit, hundreds of artists will fill the Museum’s galleries with their work. Free 4 All is a commitment to unfiltered community building.

Join us in celebrating the amazing cultural bounty that surrounds us with free admission to the Museum, refreshments available, and live music.

AUGUST 1 – NOVEMBER 15, 2026

Samella!

Samella Lewis was a seminal figure in 20th-century American art as an artist, curator, and art historian. Her work utilized the power of art to build community and address the struggle for equality for Black Americans. In addition to establishing a visionary studio practice, Lewis was the founder of the International Review of African American Art (1975) and the Museum of African American Art (1976) and the first tenured black professor at Scripps College, where she taught from 1970-84, among many other accomplishments.

The exhibition, curated by Francine Farr PhD, will not only focus on her work as an artist, but will include work by other artists and projects that illuminate Lewis’s legacy as a mentor, leader, and organizer.

DECEMBER 5, 2026 – MARCH 21, 2027

Into the Abyss: Marsia Alexander-Clarke, Richard Brown Lethem, & Eileen Senner

Into the Abyss will consist of three solo exhibitions organized around a common theme. Artists Marsia Alexander-Clarke (video), Richard Brown Lethem (painting), and Eileen Senner (painting) all explore the picture plane as a portal of infinite space that is also a metaphor for the mind. The “abyss” of the picture plane is a space of vast emptiness, yet also one of powerful latent energies.

The picture plane is often thought of as either representational (creating an illusion of space that references the physical world) or abstract (dealing with form and color). Alexander-Clarke, Lethem, and Senner, however, all depict elements of the real world in order to access psychological space. In this dynamic, the picture plane is not a mirror of the world; it is a portal between the mind of the artist and the mind of the viewer. Whether realized in painting or video, these artists demonstrate the great potential for enlightenment and existential realization that can be found within a simple rectangle.

CURRENTLY ON VIEW

She Opens the Door

Curated by Poet-in-Residence Chloe Martinez, She Opens the Door: Women Artists and Writers Shape Language and Space features local contemporary artists exploring female agency at the

intersection of language and art. In addition to selecting artworks, Martinez provides poetry and writing to supplement the exhibition and invite other creative writers to contribute. Language is crucial for exploring female autonomy and its relationship to the structures of patriarchy. As James Baldwin stated, “…the root function of language is to control the world by describing it.” Language is the filter through which we comprehend our reality and assert our agency. Language extends beyond written words on a page. The language of visual art is intricately linked to verbal language and plays a significant role in shaping our thoughts and existence. She Opens the Door is made possible by a generous grant from the Pasadena Art Alliance.