Image: John Baldessari, One Figure (with Qualities) / Two Figures (without Qualities), 1990. Two color photographs with vinyl paint. 83 1/2 x 98 3/4 inches overall. Craig Robins Collection. © John Baldessari 1990–2026. Courtesy Estate of John Baldessari © 2025. Courtesy John Baldessari Family Foundation. Courtesy Sprüth Magers
Pérez Art Museum Miami will present 'John Baldessari: The End of the Line', described by the museum as the first major survey in South Florida devoted to the conceptual artist John Baldessari (1931–2020). The exhibition runs from August 20, 2026 through May 9, 2027, opening with a curator meet and greet on August 20, and brings together 40 works spanning painting, photography, video and installation.
The presentation draws largely from the collection of Craig Robins, identified in the museum materials as one of Baldessari’s foremost collectors, and it focuses on the artist’s foundational work from the 1960s and 1970s. PAMM says the exhibition traces Baldessari’s radical incineration of his own paintings, his serial approach to photography and his sustained investigation into the relationship between language and image.
Born in California, Baldessari began his career as a painter before turning to combinations of text and photographs that questioned established ideas about painting and authorship. The museum materials cite his 'Cremation Project' of 1970, in which he burned most of the paintings he had made between 1953 and 1966, as well as 'I Will Not Make Any More Boring Art' from the following year, which is identified as one of his most iconic critiques of the art establishment.
The exhibition also places emphasis on Baldessari’s later photographic practice. According to PAMM, he began collecting film stills, television images and other photographic reproductions during the following decade, building a large archive of source material that he incorporated freely into his work. The artist frequently obscured faces and details with brightly colored circles, extending his inquiry into how images are read and how meaning is constructed.
Baldessari’s influence is presented not only through his objects but through his teaching. The museum notes that he taught at the California Institute of the Arts from its founding in 1970 until 1988 and at the University of California, Los Angeles from 1996 to 2005, reaching generations of artists while helping define conceptual art’s expanded field.
'John Baldessari: The End of the Line' is curated by Karen Grimson, curator of the Craig Robins Collection and director of art and culture at Miami Design District. PAMM’s presentation is organized by José Carlos Diaz, senior director of curatorial affairs and chief curator, and Fabiana A. Sotillo, curatorial assistant. The opening event on August 20, 2026, runs from 6 to 8 pm and includes a curator meet and greet with Diaz and Grimson; the museum also notes that admission is free every Thursday after 5 pm.
Support for the exhibition is acknowledged from the National Endowment for the Arts, Funding Arts Network, and Jayne Binzer-Jacowitz and Steven Jacowitz. The museum’s materials list image credits for Baldessari works including 'Intersection Series: Embrace (Hand and Ear)/Seascape' from 2001 and 'Throwing Three Balls in the Air to Get a Straight Line (Best of Thirty-Six Attempts)' from 1973.
