The Phantom of Liberty: Contemporary Works in the RISD Museum Collection The Phantom of Liberty presents works by more than 40 artists, designers, and collectives in the RISD Museum collection, offering the museum’s broadest exhibition of postwar art and design to date.

These works—representing a range of media, including painting, sculpture, decorative arts, prints, drawings, and photographs—reflect various notions of “freedom” as being elusive or even imaginary ideals in contemporary life. Intersecting and overlapping themes include spirituality and religion, family and domestic spaces, and the ways power and authority shape geography and place. The exhibition also demonstrates the dynamic convergences within the visual arts and different design-based practices, revealing how disciplines have become more interdependent in recent years.

RISD Museum is supported by a grant from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts, through an appropriation by the Rhode Island General Assembly and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, and with the generous partnership of the Rhode Island School of Design, its Board of Trustees, and Museum Governors.