3,000 years of art

Acclaimed BBC series inspires massive new religious art exhibit at MFAH

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston Living with the Gods exhibit

"The Stream Crosses the Path" by John Biggers is one of the many divinely inspired works at MFAH's new exhibit.

Courtesy of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

For as long as humanity has had gods, people have painted, sculpted, sung, danced, carved, woven, performed, and sketched to connect with them. The desire to touch the divine with our own creations is one of the few universal constants across history and geography.

That is why the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston is presenting Living with the Gods: Art, Beliefs, and Peoples, October 27, 2024-January 20, 2025. The massive exhibit is the capstone of the MFAH’s centennial celebration and will cover a remarkable 11 galleries. The collection includes more than 200 pieces from across 3,000 years and every continent except Antarctica.

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston Living with the Gods exhibit The exhibit will include this Hanukkah lamp.Courtesy of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

Instrumental in bringing this collection to life is Neil MacGregor. A former director of the National Gallery in London, MacGregor created a phenomenal BBC radio series and authored a book (both also called Living with the Gods) to detail the way humans have used art to honor and placate our deities.

“Neil MacGregor’s acclaimed 2017 BBC radio series and book brilliantly chronicled this enduring form of human expression,” Gary Tinterow, director and Margaret Alkek Williams chair of the MFAH, said in a statement. “We are honored that he brought that perspective to Houston, making it visible through objects chosen from our own collections as well as some truly exceptional loans.”

The pieces on display are both modern and ancient. MFAH has arranged them thematically, focusing on depictions of water, the cosmos, animals, and more. Among the most notable are a Pentecostal altarpiece on loan from the Padro, Madrid that depicts the resurrection of Jesus; a silver urn used by Maharaja Madho Singh II, an Orthodox Hindu, to drink only water from the Ganges River when he traveled overseas for the coronation of King Edward IV; and Bedu masks from Africa’s Ivory Coast used during funeral dances and purification rituals.

“This exhibition is about how people everywhere have made beautiful things to negotiate their place in time and in the world; and how we use works of art to think about how we relate to each other,” MacGregor added. “Putting art into that context allows for a different conversation. In museums, many great objects can lose their original purpose, which was spiritual. An exhibition of this kind can give that purpose back to them, allowing a new and deeper approach to great and familiar works.”

Many of the items in the exhibition rarely leave their home countries for display, showing how remarkable the organization of such a collection is. It is a unique opportunity for Houstonians to see the art and tools used to reach across the void and communicate with something transcendental.

Ticket information can be found on the MFAH website.

MFAH expands

Houston museum acquires historic Masonic lodge property for new greenspace

Holland Lodge No. 1, A.F. & A.M./Facebook

The building at 4911 will be torn down for the new greenspace.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston has acquired a prime parcel to expand its campus in the Museum District. On Tuesday, December 23, the museum announced it has purchased a two-acre parcel of land at 4911 Montrose Blvd that will bring its total footprint to 16 acres.

Located just north of the Glassel School of Art, the property will be developed as a greenspace that will serve as a community lawn as well as be utilized for future museum events and parking. MFAH has retained landscape architects Nelson Byrd Woltz — the firm responsible for work at Memorial Park and the recently-opened Ismaili Center — to create the design for the new greenspace.

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston greenspace rendering A rendering offers a bird's-eye preview of the new greenspace.Image by by Cong Nie/Courtesy of Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

At this time, the museum does not have plans to build anything on the property, according to a press release.

To make way for the greenspace, the property’s existing building, Holland Lodge No. 1, will be torn down. Built in 1954 as a home for the oldest Masonic lodge chapter in Texas, the building features a sandstone mural facade. It has been for sale since at least 2005, according to a report in the Houston Chronicle.

Demolition on the site is expected to begin in spring 2026 with the greenspace opening in approximately two years, according to press materials. In addition to the Glassell School, the museum’s campus includes the Audrey Jones Beck Building, the Caroline Wiess Law Building, the Lillie and Hugh Roy Cullen Sculpture Garden, and the Nancy and Rich Kinder Building.

“We are delighted to contribute to Houston’s greenspace access with this new initiative, which will expand the museum’s 14-acre campus to a thoroughly walkable 16 acres,” Gary Tinterow, director and Margaret Alkek Williams chair of the MFAH, said in a statement. “While the primary objective for the purchase of this property is to secure land for any potential future expansion of the museum, our priority now is to create a welcoming community lawn. Thoughtfully designed by Nelson Byrd Woltz, one of the leading firms in sustainable landscape practice, the site will serve as public greenspace and provide additional parking for museum visitors.”

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