New acquisitions, including Jean-Michel Basquiat, at Norton Museum of Art

The Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, FL announced on September 15, 2025, new additions strengthening and expanding its Collection. Acquisitions and promised gifts, including more than 80 works of art by a wide range of artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Cecily Brown, Mary Cassatt, Renée Cox, Fred Eversley, Rashid Johnson, and others, reflect the Museum’s ongoing commitment to representing a wide range of artistic voices and perspectives.

These acquisitions span painting, sculpture, photography, video, and Chinese ceramics, and represent an encompassing expansion across the Museum’s core collecting areas. From experimental mixed media to historic American Modernism and 17th-century porcelain, the new works reflect a cross-generational and cross-cultural approach to collecting, with a particular focus on women artists and contemporary practice.

Contemporary Art

Since the 1990s, the Norton’s Contemporary Collection has steadily expanded, significantly enhancing the breadth and quality of the Museum’s Collection while increasing the representation of global and diverse voices.

A highlight includes the recent promised gift, Gunga Din, 1981, a painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat (American, 1960 – 1988), currently on view on the first floor of the Norton. Blending drawing, painting, street art, and historical reference, the work is inspired by Rudyard Kipling’s 1890 poem of the same name, which tells the story of a heroic Indian water carrier who saves a British soldier in battle but is later killed. Created in acrylic, oil stick, and spray paint, Gunga Din enters the Collection as a promised gift from Barbara and Norman Eig, marking a landmark moment in the Museum’s contemporary holdings.

Three works by Rashid Johnson (American, born 1977)—a film, a painting, and a sculpture—form a powerful and multifaceted addition to the Museum’s Collection. Sanguine, 2024, a promised gift short film transferred from 35mm, uses richly textured imagery and sound to explore vulnerability, tension, and emotional interiority. It is a promised gift from Hilarie and Mitchell Morgan and is co-owned with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Along with Stacked Heads, 2020, a towering bronze sculpture embedded with living plants, these works showcase the full range of Johnson’s conceptual and visual language.

The Museum also acquired Untitled (parabolic lens), 1981, by Fred Eversley (American, 1941 – 2025), who died this year. A key figure in postwar Los Angeles contemporary art, Eversley created sculptural forms that explore light, time, and gravity. While associated with the Light and Space movement, his practice was uniquely shaped by his background in engineering and a lifelong investigation into perception and energy. The Norton’s newly acquired work is from one of Eversley’s most well-known series—the parabolic lenses—which feature luminous, lens-shaped sculptures made from cast resin. It invites reflection on how we perceive light, space, and each other, and evokes a sense of energy and movement in the world around us.

The Norton’s recent acquisitions demonstrate a continued commitment to supporting women artists across generations. Nudity, Language, Smoking,2022 – 2023, by Cecily Brown (British, born 1969) and Dark Times, 2023, by Shara Hughes (American, born 1981) reflect distinct approaches to contemporary painting. Brown’s densely worked canvas blurs figuration and abstraction through expressive brushwork, while Hughes’ landscape pulses with saturated color and psychological tension. Visitors to the Norton can see Hughes’ work this fall, with her solo exhibition, Shara Hughes: Inside Outside, opening November 15, 2025.

Photography

Recent acquisitions of approximately 40 works in photography highlight artists who use the medium to explore identity, narrative, and materiality.

Renée Cox’s (American, born 1960) Missy at Home, 2008, printed 2025, is part of her series The Discreet Charm of the Bougie, in which she plays the character Missy—an affluent Black housewife navigating the expectations of domestic life. Drawing on her background in fashion photography, Cox constructs highly stylized self-portraits that examine race, privilege, and self-presentation with sharp wit and theatrical flair.

A series of works by Fabiola Menchelli (Mexican, born 1983), including running towards the fire,2023, morse remorse, 2024, and lava sledding, 2023, are unique folded photograms that expand the Museum’s holdings in experimental photography. These richly colored, sculptural works were recently featured in certain silence (December 7, 2024 – March 23, 2025), the artist’s first solo museum exhibition at the Norton, presented as part of her tenure as the 2024–25 Mary Lucille Dauray Artist-in-Residence. Based in Mexico City, Menchelli uses cameraless processes to explore perception, abstraction, and the transformative possibilities of light and form.

Additional works by Jess T. Dugan (American, born 1986), Tania Franco Klein (Mexican, born 1990), Cyprien Gaillard (French, born 1980), Susan Lipper (American, born 1953), and Noémie Goudal (French, born 1984) reflect a broad range of approaches, from conceptual portraiture and experimental process to documentary form and time-based media.

Modern Art

A standout addition to the Modern Collection is Mother Jeanne Nursing Her Baby, 1907 – 1908, a chalk and pastel drawing by Mary Cassatt (American, 1844 – 1926). Known for her intimate portrayals of women and children, Cassatt brought a modern sensibility to domestic subjects. This work enters the Collection through a bequest from Marion Kleinkramer, enhancing the Museum’s holdings of early 20th-century women artists.

Additional acquisitions include paintings by Reginald Marsh (American, born France, 1898 – 1954), Fairfield Porter (American, 1907 – 1975), and a series of oil paintings by Dorothy Underhill (American, 1913 – 1997). Ranging from urban street scenes to quiet domestic interiors and landscapes, these works expand the Norton’s holdings in Impressionism, social realism, and mid-century figuration.

Asian

The Museum’s Collection of Asian art, spanning 5,000 years, has grown from the approximately 130 Chinese works given by founder Ralph Norton to nearly 1,000 objects. Three new acquisitions enhance the Museum’s collection of Chinese blue-and-white porcelain from the Qing dynasty. Dating to the Kangxi reign (1662 – 1722), each work was produced in the imperial kilns of Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Province, a center of porcelain innovation for centuries. Featuring underglaze cobalt decoration and intricate surface patterning, the vessels reflect the technical refinement and symbolic visual language of Qing ceramics.

ABOUT THE NORTON MUSEUM OF ART 

The Norton Museum of Art, Florida’s largest art museum, is home to a distinguished collection of art, with holdings in American, European, Contemporary and Asian Art and Photography.

Founded in 1941 by Ralph Hubbard Norton and his wife, Elizabeth Calhoun Norton, the Museum collects, preserves, and exhibits art, and engages visitors through exhibitions, events and live entertainment featuring local musicians and performance artists. Public programming is year-round and designed to inspire conversations and build community through the power of art. The Museum is accessible to all.

The Museum’s expansion and renovation was led by London-based architecture firm Foster + Partners, adding a building and more than 12,000 square feet of new gallery space, an educational center, a store and restaurant, a sculpture garden, and a Great Hall, serving as the Museum’s “living room.” The campus is home to renovated, Museum-owned, 1920s-era cottages that house artists-in-residence.