Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Artist’s Birth
JACKSONVILLE, FL — MOCA Jacksonville, a cultural institute of the University of North Florida, joins more than 70 museums across the country exhibiting works by abstract artist Joan Mitchell during what would be her 100th birthday year. Honoring Joan Mitchell will be installed on MOCA’s first floor, where the community can experience this tribute to one of the most significant artists of the post-war era and honor Mitchell’s groundbreaking contributions to American abstract painting free of charge from February 1 through June 15, 2025.
ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
Honoring Joan Mitchell presents a selection of Mitchell's works from the museum’s Donald and Maria Cox Collection, complemented by a loan from a local private collection.
Joan Mitchell’s career spanned more than four decades, during which her primary medium was oil on canvas, though she also worked in pastels and printmaking. Through this her art became rooted in abstraction— set apart for its physicality, daring use of color, and connection to her everyday experiences.
Inspired by landscape, nature and poetry, Mitchell developed her own recognizable abstract technique, becoming known for her particular compositional rhythms, coloration, and the sweeping gestural brushstrokes of her large, and often multipaneled, paintings.
The works presented here, Chord III, Sunflower III, and the two Untitled drawings, are all from the artist’s later period, when she relocated to Vétheuil, a village north of Paris in France. From 1984 to 1986 Mitchell completed the seven paintings that comprised the Chord series. Struggling with illness at the time, she referred to these as her “sick” years. Because of this, and the relative darkness of the works in relation to earlier series, critics have often viewed these through the lens of the artist’s own mortality. Her late Sunflower series, inspired by her own garden of sunflowers at Vétheuil, are among the most experimental and vibrant of her works, describing with calligraphic energy the life cycle of the sunflower.
“Music, poems, landscape, and dogs make me want to paint… And painting is what allows me to survive.” — Joan Mitchell, 1974
This small but poignant exhibition highlights her diverse body of work, which includes both paintings and works on paper, showcasing Mitchell’s profound connection to landscape, color, and the human experience. As part of the museum’s ongoing commitment to community engagement, Honoring Joan Mitchell is accessible to all visitors at no charge, and the museum will continue to offer free access to all exhibitions weekly during VyStar Free Saturdays @ MOCA and on the first and third Wednesday of each month during Free Museum Nights @ MOCA presented by Florida Blue.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Joan Mitchell (1925, Chicago - Vétheuil, 1992) is widely recognized as one of the most influential figures in 20th-century abstract art. A native of Chicago, Mitchell studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago before moving to France and, later, New York, where she became an integral member of the “New York School”—an informal group of artists and writers who helped establish New York City as center of the art world, and influenced the Abstract Expressionism, Minimalism, and Pop art movements.
In 1949 Mitchell moved away from her academic training to a less representative style, and after settling in New York in 1950, she turned to painting abstractions in earnest, as her response to landscape. She exhibited regularly, alongside Kooning, Pollock, and Hofmann, a leader of the Abstract Expressionist movement in her own right.
Mitchell’s work is known for its many layers of bright color, inspired by her surroundings. She typically worked at night, creating on large canvases without an easel. It often took her up to nine months to complete a single work.
Whether inspired by the landscapes of the French countryside, the urban environment, or the poetry and music she cherished, her art is a powerful reflection of her personal experiences and emotions. Mitchell famously said, “I carry my landscapes around with me,” underscoring the deep emotional and environmental resonance of her work.
ABOUT MOCA JACKSONVILLE
The Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville is the oldest art museum in the region and one of the oldest contemporary art museums to be established in the United States.
In 1924, a group of visionary local women artists came together to imagine the kind of city they wanted Jacksonville to be — the kind of community they wanted to live in and be a part of. At the core of their vision for a rich, vital, dynamic city were art, culture, and education. Thus, what we now call MOCA Jacksonville was born — first as a series of exhibitions by artists of the day, used as a fundraising tool to support public school education; then as a guild; and later as an art museum and educational leader.
More than a century later, MOCA’s mission remains focused on the art, artists, and ideas of our time, with a vision that unites education, creativity, and community building in the heart of downtown Jacksonville.
For more information including hours of operation, admission prices and upcoming exhibitions and programs, call 904.366.6911 or visit mocajacksonville.unf.edu.
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