Current Exhibitions
Upcoming Events
At the Central Library
Interested in proposing an exhibition for the Central Library's Gallery J space? View our Exhibition guidelines.
Central Library in Copley Square (Special Collections Department)
This Just In highlights a selection of recent acquisitions that have found their place within BPL’s collections and illuminate the dynamic nature of creativity and the narratives that shape our world. Between 2019 and 2023, Special Collections and the Leventhal Map & Education Center made over 200 acquisitions through donations and purchases. Richly diverse in their origins and focus, each acquisition enhances public understanding of our past and current cultural lives.
Patrons are welcome to experience and engage with this display in the Special Collections lobby from 9:30 am - 4:30 pm, Tuesday - Friday. Inside the library, we are located on the 4th floor of the Boylston Street Building. Take the Glass Elevator near the Boylston entrance to "3U."
Teen Central Permanent Rotating Exhibit
Central Library in Copley Square (Teen Central)
This exhibition is in partnership with the Department of Youth Services (DYS) and the DYS Art Showcase program.
Since 2008, the BPL and DYS Metro Region staff have partnered to facilitate monthly library visits to DYS Metro.
This presentation of artwork represents a selection of the work from the annual DYS Art Showcase, which highlights and promotes the talents of young people from across Massachusetts. Each year, BPL Youth Services will select and purchase art from the Art Showcase for display in a permanent, rotating collection at Teen Central. The BPL is proud to support these artists and all at DYS.
For more information, please contact BPL Teen Outreach Librarian Maty Cropley at mcropley@bpl.org.
At the Branch Libraries
Jane Keddy: Women's Work
Jamaica Plain Branch Library
February 29, 2024 - May 1, 2024
The Jamaica Plain Branch Library, in collaboration with The Friends of the Jamaica Plain Branch of the Boston Public Library and Uforge, is thrilled to unveil the latest edition of its annual rotating art program for 2024. The library is excited to showcase "Jane Keddy: Women’s Work".
Hailing from Gloucester, Jane Keddy is a versatile artist with expertise in printmaking and textile art, exploring various mediums such as ecoprinting, shibori, and textile collage. Commencing her artistic journey with batik, she expanded into silkscreen printing on paper and fabric.
Jane Keddy's current passions involve ecoprinting—a technique utilizing live plants, pressure, and steam—and shibori, a Japanese method of dyeing cloth that employs folding, binding, clamping, and other resist methods. She holds esteemed memberships in the Rocky Neck Art Colony, Rockport Art Association, Salted Cod Arthouse Gallery, and the Surface Design Association.
The featured collection, "Women’s Work," comprises fabric panels crafted by Keddy. These panels integrate vintage textiles, photographs, and stitching to depict women in both traditional and non-traditional occupations. Serving as a visual narrative, the collection illustrates the diversity and significance of women’s labor over the past 150 years, offering a poignant homage to the history of working women through textiles and photography.
Jane Keddy: Women’s Work is on view from February 29 - May 1, 2024, with a reception to be held on Thursday, February 29, 2024, 5:30 - 7:30 PM. The exhibition space is located on the lower level.
This exhibition is made possible through the generous support of The Friends of the Jamaica Plain Branch of the Boston Public Library, a non-profit organization committed to planning and sponsoring free educational and cultural programs for all patrons of the JP Library.
Art Exhibit - Go Down to the River and Talk to 'JAH': Quilts by Susan Thompson
Hyde Park Branch Library
April 6, 2024 - June 29, 2024
Presented by Artists-at-Large, Go Down to the River and Talk to 'JAH' : Quilts by Susan Thompson will be on display from April 6 through June 29, 2024.
This exhibit of art quilts created by Susan Thompson is a glimpse into the various processes that she uses to make art. Through fabric, color, and texture, she attempts to create designs, tell stories, and strives to communicate the truth as she knows it. Almost all of her quilts have prayers for peace and freedom for all people embedded in them. Art enables her to express the deep and abiding love which fires life.
Susan Thompson is a textile and mixed media artist and arts educator based in Boston, and a member of Northeastern University's AAMARP group (African American Master Artist Residency Program). She transforms fabric by dyeing, drawing and painting, waxing, sculpting, printing, embellishing and sewing. She is very much encouraged by her African heritage and the struggles of her people for freedom and survival. Many of her artworks are dedicated to those ancestors who extend back to the beginning of humankind. She says that she best serves humanity through her creative abilities as an artist.
Join us for an artist's talk and closing reception on June 1, 2024, 12:00 pm - 2:00 pm.
Ann Turley Retrospective
Roslindale Branch Library
April 18, 2024 - June 7, 2024
Works in a variety of media from Roslindale artist Ann Turley's 60-year career are on view through June 7.
The artist explains, "My images are created with oil paint, palette knife, brush, rollers, splatters, spots and streaks. They are paint, and at the same time they are ocean. I use paint to surprise and enchant the viewer, evoking the feel of spray from the water, the smell of freshness in the moist air, the ocean breeze and warm sun on your face. Eternity. Infinity. I make art because it is the best thing I do."
