The Barnes Foundation Presents Sky Hopinka: Red Metal Dust
Newly commissioned site-specific installation by American artist, on the occasion of the United States’s 250th anniversary
On view March 21, 2026–January 18, 2027
Philadelphia, PA, January 28, 2026—In 2026, the Barnes Foundation presents Sky Hopinka: Red Metal Dust, a new installation of meditative photographic landscapes by multidisciplinary Native American artist Sky Hopinka (Ho-Chunk Nation/Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians).
Red Metal Dustis sponsored by Comcast NBCUniversal.
On view from March 21, 2026, through January 18, 2027, in the Walter and Leonore Annenberg Court, Red Metal Dust is a site-specific installation of 11 panels presented in the court’s wall niches. Referencing the Ho-Chunk tribe’s name for copper, this installation thoughtfully interrogates American histories and Indigenous homelands through the layering of photography and copper sheets. This is only the second occasion an artist has been commissioned to create such an installation for the Annenberg Court, following Pat Steir’s Silent Secret Waterfalls: The Barnes Series in 2019. Red Metal Dust is free and open to the public.
“The Barnes’s 2026 slate of exhibitions and installations are part of Philadelphia's yearlong commemoration of the United States’s 250th anniversary. It promises to be a banner year of citywide programming that honors Philadelphia's role as the birthplace of American democracy,” says Thom Collins, Neubauer Family Executive Director and President of the Barnes. “Our curatorial team has devised thoughtful exhibitions and installations highlighting American artists of diverse and varied perspectives, and we are honored to kick the year off with Sky Hopinka’s Red Metal Dust, a stunning series of photographic landscapes that inspire deep contemplation about Indigenous homelands, a topic that is particularly poignant as the nation celebrates this milestone anniversary.”
“Red Metal Dust is a body of work that considers landscape as a site of emanation, shaped as much by what remains as by what has been removed,” says Hopinka. “The title draws from the Ho-Chunk way of describing copper, naming the material not as monument but as remainder, something carried, scattered, and endured. In this context, copper becomes less a surface than a witness, resilient and reflective, shaped through contact rather than display. Across the works, landscape is approached as a layered field of return, where images accumulate, echo, and settle into one another over time.”
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Sky Hopinka (Ho-Chunk Nation/Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians) was born and raised in Ferndale, Washington, and spent a number of years in Palm Springs and Riverside, California; Portland, Oregon; and Milwaukee. In Portland, he studied and taught Chinuk Wawa, a language indigenous to the Lower Columbia River Basin. His video, photo, and text work centers on personal positions of Indigenous homeland and landscape and designs of language as containers of culture.
Hopinka’s work has screened at the Sundance Film Fest, Toronto International Film Festival, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Courtisane Festival, Punto de Vista International Documentary Film Festival, and New York Film Festival. His work was a part of the 2017 Whitney Biennial, the 2018 FRONT Triennial, and the 2021 Prospect.5 Triennial. In 2019, he was a guest curator at the Whitney Biennial and participated in Cosmopolis #2 at the Centre Pompidou. He has had solo exhibitions at the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, in 2020 and at LUMA in Arles, France, in 2022. He was a 2018–19 fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, a 2018 Sundance Art of Nonfiction Fellow, a 2019 Art Matters Fellow, a 2020 recipient of the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts, a 2020 Guggenheim Fellow, and a 2021 Forge Project Fellow. He received the 2022 Infinity Award in Art from the International Center of Photography and was a 2022 MacArthur Fellow.
EXHIBITION ORGANIZATION
Sky Hopinka: Red Metal Dust was commissioned by the Barnes and is on view from March 21, 2026, through January 18, 2027.
This installation is part of Philadelphia’s yearlong commemoration of America’s 250th anniversary. The year encompasses major sporting events alongside cultural exhibitions and community programs that honor Philadelphia’s role as the birthplace of American democracy. For more information about this historic milestone year, visit philly2026.com.
EXHIBITION SPONSORS
Sky Hopinka: Red Metal Dust is sponsored by Comcast NBCUniversal.
Meaningful support is provided by the City of Philadelphia and an anonymous donor. Additional generous support is provided by Dennis Alter, the Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation, Mary Jo Grdina and Walter A. Brogan, Margaret C. Hallenbeck, Arthur M. Kaplan and R. Duane Perry, James McKinney, and Sarah Morthland.
Ongoing funding for exhibitions comes from the Christine and Michael Angelakis Exhibition Fund, Jill and Sheldon Bonovitz Exhibition Fund, Lois and Julian Brodsky Exhibition Fund, Elaine W. Camarda and A. Morris Williams, Jr. Exhibition Fund, Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, Christine and George Henisee Exhibition Fund, Aileen and Brian Roberts Exhibition Fund, and Tom and Margaret Lehr Whitford Exhibition Fund.
In addition, funding for all exhibitions comes from contributors to the Barnes Foundation Exhibition Fund:
Jill and Sheldon Bonovitz, Joan Carter and John Aglialoro, Julia and David Fleischner, Victoria McNeil Le Vine, Leigh and John Middleton, Jeanette and Joe Neubauer, Aileen and Brian Roberts
John Alchin and Hal Marryatt, N. Judith Broudy, Emily and Michael Cavanagh, Marianne N. Dean, Eugene and Michelle Dubay, Penelope P. Harris, Jones & Wajahat Family, Lisa D. Kabnick and John H. McFadden, Victor F. Keen and Jeanne Ruddy, Marguerite Lenfest, Maribeth and Steven Lerner, Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation, Hilarie and Mitchell Morgan, Cathy and Henry Nassau, The Park Family, Wendy and Mark Rayfield, Anne and Bruce Robinson, Adele K. Schaeffer, Katie and Tony Schaeffer, Donna and Jerry Slipakoff, Dr. and Mrs. Eugene E. Stark, Joan F. Thalheimer, Bruce and Robbi Toll, van Beuren Charitable Foundation, and Randi Zemsky and Bob Lane.
ABOUT THE BARNES FOUNDATION
The Barnes is a nonprofit cultural and educational institution that shares its unparalleled art collection with the public, organizes special exhibitions, and presents programming that fosters new ways of thinking about human creativity. The Barnes collection is displayed in ensembles that integrate art and objects from across cultures and time periods, overturning traditional hierarchies and revealing universal elements of human expression. Home to one of the world’s finest collections of impressionist, post-impressionist, and modern paintings—including the largest groups of paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Paul Cézanne in existence—the Barnes brings together renowned canvases by Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Amedeo Modigliani, and Vincent van Gogh, alongside African, Asian, ancient, medieval, and Native American art as well as metalwork, furniture, and decorative art.
The Barnes was established by Dr. Albert C. Barnes in 1922 to “promote the advancement of education and the appreciation of the fine arts and horticulture.” A visionary collector and pioneering educator, Dr. Barnes was also a fierce advocate for the civil rights of African Americans, women, and the economically marginalized. Committed to racial equality and social justice, he established a scholarship program to support young Black artists, writers, and musicians who wanted to further their education. Dr. Barnes became actively involved in the Harlem Renaissance, during which he collaborated with philosopher Alain Locke and Charles S. Johnson, the scholar and activist, to promote awareness of the artistic value of African art.
Since moving to Philadelphia in 2012, the Barnes has expanded its commitment to diversity, inclusion, and social justice, teaching visual literacy in groundbreaking ways; investing in original scholarship relating to its collection; and enhancing accessibility throughout every facet of its programs.
The Barnes is situated in Lenapehoking, the ancestral homeland of the Lenape people. Read our Land Acknowledgment.
Hours and ticket prices are listed on our website.
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FOR MORE INFORMATION
Deirdre Maher, Director of Communications / 215.278.7160, press@barnesfoundation.org
Online press office: barnesfoundation.org/press