During the 20th century, developments in culture, politics, and technology catalyzed revolutionary approaches to art making. Artists expanded traditional models—or dispensed with them entirely—while experimenting with new techniques, forms, and materials. This gallery explores the choices made by sculptors working in the United States and Europe that challenged the boundaries of expression.

Modern innovations such as the discovery of x-rays, the popularization of the camera, telephone, and radio, and the construction of skyscrapers changed the way people saw and communicated. The traumas of two world wars further reshaped reality, while immigration facilitated creative exchange. In response, artists disrupted viewers’ perceptions, not only of form and space, but of the world around them. Sculptors broke with classical notions of beauty and idealized form, developing new ways of working and modes of representation that seemed better suited to this dynamic period.

This is the first of several new galleries for modern art opening in 2025, made possible by a generous gift from the Wyss Foundation, which reenvisions the MFA’s presentation of 20th-century art. It bridges displays of the Museum’s European art with new installations of the contemporary collection, and presents work by artists including Jean Arp, Louise Bourgeois, Alexander Calder, Alberto Giacometti, Louise Nevelson, Isamu Noguchi, and Pablo Picasso. Spanning Auguste Rodin to Simone Leigh, the gallery invites visitors to explore the trajectory of three-dimensional art from the end of the 19th century to the present.