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The Whitney Museum of American Art’s Independent Study Program (ISP) marks the culmination of the 2024–25 academic year with two capstone exhibitions: the ISP Curatorial Studies Exhibition at Ramscale Penthouse, May 9–18, the ISP Studio Exhibition at Westbeth Gallery, May 9–25, and a symposium at the Whitney on Sunday, May 18.

These presentations showcase the work of the 2024–25 ISP cohort across three areas of concentration: Curatorial Studies Program, Studio Program, and Critical Studies Program.

The ISP Curatorial Studies Exhibition at Ramscale Penthouse, May 9–18,

The Curatorial Studies Program presents a grammar of attention, an exhibition that aims to
draw attention to what artists Gordon Matta-Clark and, almost four decades later, David
Hammons carried out on the Hudson River in New York. Situated in a space that offers a
singular view of Hammons’s Day’s End (2014-21) on the piers, this exhibition acknowledges the
contiguous gestures as an invitation to attend to places, infrastructures, and social relations.
Invoking the spirit of Hammons and Matta-Clark, a grammar of attention gathers artistic
practices that attune themselves to the material realities that mark our worlds. The exhibition
unfolds as a resonant chamber through a program of performances, installations, and
workshops. a grammar of attention is both an invitation and an offering: to bear and build
witness to that which is fraught, incomplete, unauthorized, unsettled, yet tethered to our present.
 
The featured artists include Zalika Azim; Fadl Fakhouri, Noel Maghathe, and Fargo Tbakhi; the black.gaze in collaboration with Cierra Michele Peters and Rai Terry; Haitham Haddad; Fatemeh Kazemi; Arnold J. Kemp; Christian Nyampeta; Luvuyo Equiano Nyawose; Rafael Sánchez; and Asia Stewart.

a grammar of attention is curated by the 2024–25 Helena Rubinstein Curatorial
Fellows, Bea Ortega Botas, Kennedy Hollins Jones, Tamara Khasanova, and Ntshadi
Mofokeng. The exhibition will be on view May 9–18 at Ramscale Penthouse, located at 463
West St Penthouse, New York, NY 10014. An opening reception for a grammar of attention will
be held at Ramscale Penthouse on Friday, May 9, from 6–8 pm.

ISP Studio Exhibition at Westbeth Gallery, May 9–25,
The Studio Program exhibition, Prototype, presents new work by the 2024–25 Elaine G.
Weitzen Studio Program Fellows Nooshin Askari, Paige K. Bradley, Dahlia Bloomstone, Cheeny
Celebrado-Royer, Rhea Dillon, Niloufar Emamifar, Valentina Jager, Ash Moniz, Daniel Melo
Morales, Iulia Nistor, Pegah Pasalar, Chantal Peñalosa Fong, Alex Schmidt, Julia Taszycka, and
misra walker.
Curated by Juana Berrío, the exhibition will be on view May 9–25 at Westbeth
Gallery, a nonprofit fine arts gallery located at 55 Bethune St, New York, New York 10014. An
opening reception for Prototype will be held at Westbeth Gallery on Friday, May 9, from 6–8
pm. 

Symposium at the Whitney on Sunday, May 18.

The 2024–25 Helena Rubinstein Critical Studies Fellows will present their current research at
the annual ISP Critical Studies Symposium on Sunday, May 18, from 2–5:30 pm in the
Museum’s third-floor theater. Genevieve Lipinsky de Orlov, Stephen Woo, Sahar Khraibani, Iulia
Nistor, Stella Liantonio, Joann Evans, and Adrienne Jacobson Oliver will share short papers that
address critical topics in contemporary culture. The fellows will be joined in conversation by art
historian Irene V. Small, Associate Professor at Princeton University, and artist and philosopher
Denise Ferreira da Silva, Professor at New York University. The symposium will be livestreamed
with live captioning and ASL interpretation will be provided. The event is free and registration is
required. Following the symposium, the ISP will host a closing reception beginning at 6:00 pm at
Ramscale Penthouse. While the reception is free and open to the public, advance registration is
required.

The Independent Study Program symposium, exhibitions, and opening events are free and
open to the public. The ISP Curatorial Studies Program and Studio Program exhibitions are
open Wednesday–Sunday, 1–6 pm; closed Monday and Tuesday. For full details and additional
information about the ISP, please visit whitney.org/isp. 

PRESS CONTACT 

For press materials and image requests, please visit whitney.org/press or contact:
Ashley Reese, Director of Communications
Whitney Museum of American Art
(212) 671-1846
Ashley_Reese@whitney.org
Whitney Press Office
whitney.org/press
(212) 570-3633
pressoffice@whitney.org  

PROGRAM SUPPORT
Generous support for the Independent Study Program is provided by Joanne Leonhardt
Cassullo, the Dorothea L. Leonhardt Foundation, the Helena Rubinstein Foundation, and Diane
and Robert Moss.
Significant support is provided by The Capital Group Charitable Foundation, Margaret Morgan
and Wesley Phoa, Gloria H. Spivak, and the Whitney Contemporaries through their annual Art
Party benefit. 

ABOUT THE ISP
The Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program (ISP) is an experimental study community
dedicated to fostering critical thinking, cross-disciplinary scholarship and writing, and multimedia
artistic practices. The ISP cultivates a rigorous intellectual environment where participants are
encouraged to engage deeply with contemporary issues through extended conversation and
collaboration. Through seminars, reading groups, workshops, screenings, performances, poetry
readings, studio visits, and an array of collaborative endeavors, the program nurtures and
challenges the creative processes of artists, curators, and scholars who are committed to
innovative, sustainable, and activist practices.
Each year fifteen individuals are selected to participate in the Studio Program, four in the
Curatorial Program, and six in the Critical Studies Program, for a total cohort of twenty-five.
Curatorial and critical studies participants are designated as Helena Rubinstein Fellows in
recognition of the substantial support provided to the program by the Helena Rubinstein
Foundation and Studio participants are Weitzen Family Fellows in acknowledgment of the one-
time relocation stipend generously provided by the Weitzen family. 

ABOUT THE WHITNEY
The Whitney Museum of American Art, founded in 1930 by the artist and philanthropist Gertrude
Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–1942), houses the foremost collection of American art from the
twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Mrs. Whitney, an early and ardent supporter of modern
American art, nurtured groundbreaking artists when audiences were still largely preoccupied
with the Old Masters. From her vision arose the Whitney Museum of American Art, which has
been championing the most innovative art of the United States for ninety years. The core of the
Whitney’s mission is to collect, preserve, interpret, and exhibit American art of our time and
serve a wide variety of audiences in celebration of the complexity and diversity of art and culture
in the United States. Through this mission and a steadfast commitment to artists, the Whitney
has long been a powerful force in support of modern and contemporary art and continues to
help define what is innovative and influential in American art today.
Whitney Museum Land Acknowledgment
The Whitney is located in Lenapehoking, the ancestral homeland of the Lenape. The name
Manhattan comes from their word Mannahatta, meaning “island of many hills.” The Museum’s
current site is close to land that was a Lenape fishing and planting site called Sapponckanikan
(“tobacco field”). The Whitney acknowledges the displacement of this region’s original
inhabitants and the Lenape diaspora that exists today. 

As a museum of American art in a city with vital and diverse communities of Indigenous people,
the Whitney recognizes the historical exclusion of Indigenous artists from its collection and
program. The Museum is committed to addressing these erasures and honoring the
perspectives of Indigenous artists and communities as we work for a more equitable future. To
read more about the Museum’s Land Acknowledgement, visit the Museum’s website. 

Image credit:
Dahlia Bloomstone, R-SHARK WOKE UP!, 2024, courtesy of the artist