Clyfford Still Museum
Home to one of the world’s most intact public collections of any major artist, the Clyfford Still Museum offers nine beautiful galleries of Still’s art, historic photos, objects and letters from the Clyfford Still Archives, interactive features, a pair of tranquil outdoor terraces, views into storage and conservation areas, a hands-on art creation studio, shopping, exciting programs and events, and more.
The Clyfford Still Museum is located in the heart of Denver’s Golden Triangle Creative District. The two-story, 28,500-square-foot building was designed by Brad Cloepfil of Allied Works Architecture specifically to display Clyfford Still’s work.
Considered one of the most important painters of the 20th century, Clyfford Still (1904–1980) was among the first generation of Abstract Expressionist artists. The Clyfford Still Museum collection represents 93 percent of the artist’s lifetime output, including approximately 3,125 works created between 1920 and 1980 as well as his complete archives.
Current Exhibition:
You Select: A Community-Curated Exhibition
August 19, 2022–February 12, 2023
In the culminating exhibition of CSM’s 10th anniversary celebration year, the Museum handed the curatorial reins to art lovers from the Denver community and beyond. Designed to foster far-reaching engagement and appreciation of Clyfford Still’s art and artistic legacy, the exhibition will share the curation of CSM’s city-owned collection with a broad and diverse audience. Like the artist himself, CSM believes there is valuable knowledge to gain about Still’s art and the power of abstraction from the surrounding communities and passionate individuals from around the world. Community participants chose the exhibition’s artworks from five themes. Exhibition gallery text and interpretive content will incorporate participants’ perspectives on their selections.
Upcoming Exhibition:
Awful Bigness
February 17–September 10, 2023
Organized by the Museum’s associate curator, Bailey Placzek, in collaboration with CSM’s director, Joyce Tsai, Awful Bigness fills the Museum’s largest, skylit galleries and celebrates Clyfford Still’s biggest, most ambitious works. This installation follows a chronological display of Still’s works in CSM’s first four rooms, which overviews Still’s groundbreaking path to abstraction. Still spent his childhood and adolescence in the West and in an interview, he referred to that experience as one that taught him to respect the “awful bigness of the land, the men and the machines.” In subsequent years, he worked on an enormous scale, and each time, he had to confront the awful bigness of the vast expanse of blank canvas.
Spotlight: Inside Conservation
Sep 15, 2023–May 5, 2024
As the third installment in CSM’s “Spotlight” series, nine distinct conservation “spotlights” will be integrated into the chronological installation across all nine of CSM’s galleries. Each conservation vignette explores a specific conservation issue or topic relevant to CSM’s collections, offering viewers an enhanced understanding of Still’s process, materials, and art through the lens of conservation at the Clyfford Still Museum. Conservation spotlights are illustrated through interpretative gallery text, scientific imagery, and related artworks. The spotlight concepts build in complexity over the course of the installation, providing the viewer with a linear way of understanding both the technical and philosophical scope of conservation and preservation-related practices.
