The Nasher Collection represents a compendium of revolutionary ideas: Art of the last 150 years can largely be seen as a continuous re-evaluation of norms and accepted practices, an extended period of cultural innovation with each generation of artists pushing against or blazing new trails from the new ground established by the preceding generation.

A brief selection includes Medardo Rosso’s radical experiments with the casting process to express the sweet ephemerality of experience; the seismic shift caused by Pablo Picasso’s development of the visual language of Cubism; Naum Gabo’s use of newly developed, space-age materials expressing the technological ethos of the age and effectively dematerializing sculpture; as well as the ever finer distillation of form to its essentials beginning with Brancusi and running through Minimalism to the present day.

Artists working today continue to pursue many of these developments, adding their unique, contemporary perspectives and broadening the potential meanings of the forms. "A Tradition of Revolution" presents a cross-section of the Nasher Collection and the sculptural innovations of the last 150 years within the context of concurrent philosophical, scientific, and societal shifts. Ranging from the beginnings of Modernism in the work of Rodin, Gauguin, and others to radical experiments of the present day, the exhibition will include works never before seen at the Nasher, including several recent acquisitions.