Image: Bruce Davidson, Time of Change, 1963. Gelatin silver print, 11 × 14 inches (27.9 × 35.6 cm). Collection of the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC. Anonymous gift, 2018.24.123. © Bruce Davidson.
The Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, is presenting ‘Turn the volume up!’, an exhibition examining how artists, activists and everyday people have used their voices to challenge injustice, build communities and shape public life. The exhibition is on view in the Brenda La Grange Johnson and Heather Johnson Sargent Pavilion from August 27, 2026, through July 11, 2027.
Featuring photography, painting, prints, sculpture, installation and archival materials, the exhibition considers how acts including voting, petitioning, protesting, photographing events and making speeches can contribute to broader social movements. Its presentation coincides with the 250th anniversary of the United States, placing the works within a history of American democracy and its continuing disputes over power, representation and participation.
‘Turn the volume up!’ is divided into five thematic sections: ‘Remarks’, ‘Organize’, ‘Records’, ‘Dissents’ and ‘Petitions’. The structure draws on governmental processes and community organizing, linking individual expressions with collective action and the ways public discourse is formed. The museum says artworks will be rotated during the exhibition’s run, drawing on its collection of works connected to social justice and community organizing.
The exhibition includes works by Kara Walker, Carrie Mae Weems, the Guerrilla Girls, Sam Durant, Robert Colescott, Lyle Ashton Harris, Bruce Davidson, Thomas Hirschhorn, Carlos Vega, Marielle Plaisir, Jamal Cyrus, Reggie Burrows Hodges and Peter Williams, among many others. The museum’s featured-artist list also includes Louise Bourgeois, Mike Kelley, Kiki Smith and Nancy Spero for ACT UP, alongside artists working across photography, painting, sculpture, video and printmaking.
Among the works identified by the museum are Walker’s screenprints from the 2005 portfolio ‘Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated)’, including ‘Signal Station, Summit of Maryland Heights’ and ‘Confederate Prisoners Being Conducted from Jonesborough to Atlanta’. The exhibition also presents Spider Martin’s ‘Dr. King Speaks to the Crowd of 25,000 people at the March’s End’, a 1965 photograph, and Sam Durant’s ‘…For People Who Refuse to Knuckle Down’ from 2004. Other works include Carrie Mae Weems’s ‘Ode to Affirmative Action’ of 1989 and Carlos Vega’s ‘Who is Malala’ of 2016.
The show is organized by Xuxa Rodríguez, the museum’s Patsy R. and Raymond D. Nasher Curator of Contemporary Art, with support from Curatorial Associate Julianne Miao. It is supported by the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation, the Janine & J. Tomilson Hill Family Fund, the Nancy A. Nasher and David J. Haemisegger Family Fund for Exhibitions, the Frank Edward Hanscom Quasi Endowment and the John & Anita Schwarz Family Endowment. Nari Ward’s installation ‘We the People’, which turns thousands of shoelaces into a reflection on democracy and belonging, opens at the museum on the same day. The Nasher Museum is located at 2001 Campus Drive, Durham, North Carolina, and admission is free.
