An examination of artworks that illuminate the critical role of community among artists active in Philadelphia, Chicago, Massachusetts, San Francisco, and New York

All artists enrich their creative lives through engagement with others, especially fellow artists. Peers provide inspiration, share mutual interests, provide points of rivalry, commiserate in setbacks, and celebrate successes. Understanding the relationships between artists, especially those active in specific communities, tells a compelling story about the values and character of a place. It is a way to center people rather than style and brings empathy to bear on what artists depict.

Bodies & Souls tells overlapping stories about circles of artists through works of art in the Robert and Frances Colbourn Kohler Collection. This collection of nearly 500 artworks from the 1940s to the present, given and promised to the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Woodmere Art Museum in Philadelphia, focuses on artists who made figuration relevant to their inner and social lives. In turns irreverent, hilarious, sensual, vulnerable, and expressive, the work reflects the full range of human experience. The collection illuminates the critical role of figuration and the relevance of community among artists active in Philadelphia, Chicago, Massachusetts, San Francisco, and New York, including Luis Cruz Azaceta, Joan Brown, Gregory Gillespie, Sidney Goodman, Gladys Nilsson, and others. These stories, of an earlier generation, some now passed, can speak powerfully to artists today, especially younger emerging artists in search of circles and contexts that help them thrive.