UPCOMING EVENT
Horse, Chinese, 618–906, earthenware with sancai glaze, h. 32 1/4 in. (81.9 cm); w. 34 in. (86.4 cm); d. 13 in. (33 cm), San Antonio Museum of Art, gift of Lenora and Walter F. Brown, 2013.38.10.
Off the Wall: Year of the Horse
February 17, 2026
5:30–6:30pm
Great Hall
Celebrate the Year of the Horse at SAMA with a trot through the Asian collection. Join docents Jennifer Kirk and Carrie Klein on an exploration of the horse’s symbolism, Chinese New Year traditions, and artworks that brings centuries of culture to life. A lively and insightful way to welcome the new year!
Off the Wall is a curated tour series that explores special topics across SAMA’s collections. Each session is developed and facilitated by passionate docents who can’t wait to share the stories behind SAMA’s most captivating artworks and hidden gems.
In order to ensure an optimal experience, Off the Wall tours are limited to 25 participants. Places are available on a first-come, first-served basis. Please check in at the front desk to secure your place on the tour.
To view the exhibition, click here.
ONGOING EXHIBITIONS
Yoshioka Ichimonji Sukehide, Japanese, active ca. 1360, Wakizashi (Short Sword), Jūyo Token, Signed: Sukehide, 7th month, 18th year [of the Shōhei era], July 1363, Handmade and polished steel, 13 3/4 in. (35 cm), San Antonio Museum of Art, acquired in memory of Robert R. Clemons with funds realized from his estate, 2022.11.1
Samurai Spirit: Swords, Accessories, and Paintings
January 6, 2024 – January 3, 2027
Asian Special Exhibitions Gallery, 2nd Floor West
Learn about the Japanese samurai and their appreciation of finely honed skills in forging and polishing steel to make weapons of lethal beauty.
First recounted by oral narratives, the stories of battles, heroic pursuits, and famous samurai warriors became popular subjects of literature, theater, and pictorial arts that have endured through the ages. And their swords, polished and decorated, were revered as treasured emblems of their honorable heritage.
This exhibit features two important fourteenth century swords, a wakizashi, a short sword signed by the maker, Yoshioka Ishimonji Sukehide, dated to July, 1363, and a katana, a longer sword typically wielded with two hands, that were purchased with funds realized from the sale of the late Robert Clemons’s bequest to SAMA. Japanese swords are admired for the strength of the steel, which comes from heating and folding the metal many times, and by shaping the steel to a fine, sharp blade.
Other samurai weapons and objects round out this introduction to a major aspect of traditional Japanese culture.
To view the exhibition, click here.
The Permanent Asian Art Collection
The Lenora and Walter F. Brown Asian Art Wing
In 1990, museum trustees Walter F. and Lenora Brown began donating what has grown to over 500 Asian objects, mostly Chinese ceramics, which surveys the entire 5,000-year history of ceramics produced in China. With additional later acquisitions, the Museum’s collection of Asian art is now among the finest in the nation and is drawn from several cultures across the continent, including China, Japan, Korea, India, Tibet, Nepal, Pakistan, Mongolia, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka.
The collection was installed in its new and dedicated space, the 15,000-square-foot Lenora and Walter F. Brown Asian Art Wing, in 2005. With the installation in 2019 on the museum’s grounds of a 12-foot-high, six-and-a-half ton Taihu Rock, gifted by San Antonio’s sister city Wuxi in China, the Asian art collection became part of SAMA’s riverview.
To view the collection, click here.
PAST ASIA WEEK NEW YORK EXHIBITION
Maa Laxmi, From the Darshan Series, 2011, Manjari Sharma (b. Mumbai, India, lives and works in California), archival inkjet print in brass-embossed frame, Collection of the Birmingham Museum of Art; Museum purchase, 2020.48.2a-b, Photography credit: Manjari Sharma, © Manjari Sharma
Envisioning the Hindu Divine: Expanding Darshan and Manjari Sharma
Envisioning the Hindu Divine: Expanding Darshan and Manjari Sharma
March 7 – July 6, 2025
Guided Tours: Sunday, July 6 from 1-2pm & 2:30-3:30pm
Envisioning the Hindu Divine: Expanding Darshan and Manjari Sharma features forty historical objects from India and Southeast Asia and nine photographs by global contemporary artist Manjari Sharma. Bringing together the striking work of the rising contemporary art star with the historic collections of the Birmingham Museum of Art, this exhibition showcases nine of the most significant deities of the Hindu pantheon and their contemporary relevance in art and faith. These works serve as a gateway to the concept of darshan—seeing and being seen by the divine, a profound spiritual exchange of glances experienced through consecrated images of gods. The vibrant, varied, and sometimes contradictory stories of these gods—as well as their familial relationships with each other—are shared through the works in this exhibition.
Contemporary artist Manjari Sharma makes work that is rooted in portraiture and addresses issues of identity, multiculturalism, and personal mythology. Beginning as a multiyear, crowdfunded project on Kickstarter, Sharma’s Darshan series of photographs aimed to recreate the experience of encountering the nine Hindu deities. An extraordinary aspect of Sharma’s work is her commitment to creating each scene without digital manipulation. All items visible in the images were present when photographed, not digitally added later.
Be sure to catch their final guided tours during the last day, Sunday, July 6! Free with special exhibition admission.
To learn more, click here.
