Turn, Turn, Turn: Picturing Time

A Japanese woodblock print depicting an outdoor scene at night. There are many people walking around and looking out of a building with many trees with pink foliage in the foreground. The full moon peeks out from behind the black roof of the building.

Ando Hiroshige, Japan (1797–1858), Shin Yoshiwara Naka-no-chō yozakura [Cherry Blossoms at Night on Naka-no-chō in the New Yoshiwara], c. 1840–1842, woodcut on paper, H: 13 1/2 in, W: 8 3/4 in. Gift of Helen Baker Jones, in memory of James H. Baker, 67.333.23. Photo by Jeff Wells. 

August 5, 2025–July 2026 

Can time be held, seen, reimagined? 

Turn, Turn, Turn invites viewers to consider how artists capture, challenge, and reshape our understandings of time. Through depictions of specific hours of the day, seasonal shifts, and historical moments, many artworks anchor the intangible in the material. Prints by William Hogarth and Andō Hiroshige, for example, offer glimpses into daily life across different eras and geographies. 

Yet, the concept of time is much more challenging to render. Resisting linear and progress-driven notions of time, the works in this exhibition open pathways to alternate timelines that reclaim suppressed histories and imagine futures beyond Western colonial imposition. While Enrique Chagoya, Gade, and Patrick Nagatani propose alternate histories that prioritize cultural hybridity, others meditate on time’s fleeting nature through the trope of the memento mori.  

Together, these works reveal time not as a fixed reality, but a notion shaped by perception, culture, and power.