NEWSLETTER
November 15–April 12, 2026
Saratoga Springs, NY (November 18, 2025) — The Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery at Skidmore College presents Family Forms, an exhibition that invites visitors to consider how families are made, remade, and represented. Bringing together contemporary art and vernacular photography, Family Forms looks closely at kinship, care, and the stories we tell about who we are to one another.
Photographs, artists’ books, collage, sculpture, and video provide visitors ways to explore the spaces between our ideas about “the family” and the lived experiences of families. Much of the exhibition draws from the Tang collection with works that reflect the joys and frictions of everyday life; challenge stereotypes about the “nuclear” ideal; and expand definitions of belonging to include chosen, blended, multigenerational, queer, adoptive, foster, and non-monogamous families. Visitors are invited to reflect on their own experiences of giving and receiving care, and on the many ways relationships are made public and kept private.
The installation includes a domestic vignette built from thrifted frames displaying found photographs gifted to the Tang from Peter J. Cohen. Arranged above a historic mantelpiece, the scene turns the gallery into a living room where family pictures naturally gather. Artists with work on view include Julie Chen, Mike Disfarmer, For Freedoms, Jesse Freidin, Erika Kapin, Ann Lovett, Tracey Moffatt, PaJaMa, Milton Rogovin, Joachim Schmid, Yinka Shonibare CBE, Laurie Simmons, and Danielle St. Laurent, among others.
“Family Forms continues the Tang’s great tradition of collaborating with Skidmore faculty colleagues to produce exhibitions that reveal new connections and possibilities across all disciplines,” says Dayton Director Ian Berry. “Corinne Moss-Racusin, Professor of Psychology at Skidmore, and Rebecca McNamara, the Frances Young Tang ’61 Associate Curator, bring academic research into dialogue with art and visual culture, so visitors of all ages can see themselves and reflect on their own lives and experiences.”
“Collaborating on this exhibition has been an honor and a joy,” says Moss-Racusin. “Working with the Tang has given my students the opportunity to grapple with challenging issues of contemporary inequality from both artistic and scientific perspectives. It has also moved my teaching and research beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries and generated new insights. This interdisciplinary project embodies the very best of what a liberal arts college offers and is at the core of what makes Skidmore unique. I look forward to seeing how the exhibition sparks conversations about how families can be formed and the many forms they take.”
Visitors are invited to contribute to the exhibition by submitting their own family photographs via an online form. These images will be shown in the gallery on a digital frame throughout the run of the exhibition.
Throughout the fall semester, students in Moss-Racusin’s course “Psychology at the Tang” were embedded in the museum, meeting weekly to learn about art and how it can be used to interrogate psychological concepts. Drawing on psychological research, the students will publish labels on the exhibition webpage that respond to specific found photographs on view, offering new perspectives on memory, bias, intimacy, and belonging in family life.
Moss-Racusin and McNamara will lead a curator’s tour of the exhibition on Thursday, January 22, at noon. A reception in celebration of Family Forms and all the exhibitions on view will be on Saturday, February 14, at 4 pm. More events will be announced later.
The exhibition is free and open to the public. The Tang Museum, located on the Skidmore College campus at 815 N. Broadway in Saratoga Springs, New York, is open noon–5 pm Tuesday–Sunday, with extended hours until 9 pm on Thursdays. For more information, call the Tang’s Visitor Services Desk at 518-580-8080 or visit tang.skidmore.edu.
About Skidmore College
Founded in 1903, Skidmore College is a highly selective, private liberal arts college of about 2,700 students located in the dynamic town of Saratoga Springs, New York. Consistently ranked as a top liberal arts college by U.S. News & World Report, The Princeton Review, Forbes, and more, Skidmore has also been recognized for its innovation, value, and sustainability efforts. Skidmore fosters academic and personal excellence — all driven by a belief that Creative Thought Matters. Its comprehensive array of opportunities encompasses more than 40 bachelor’s degree programs, including popular offerings in business, psychology, and the creative and performing arts; competitive NCAA Division III athletics; world-class facilities; and hands-on civic engagement and career development resources.
About the Tang Teaching Museum
The Tang Teaching Museum at Skidmore College is a pioneer of interdisciplinary exploration and learning. A cultural anchor of New York’s Capital Region, the Tang’s approach has become a model for college and university art museums across the country—with exhibition programs that bring together visual and performing arts with interdisciplinary ideas from history, economics, biology, dance, and physics, to name just a few. The Tang has one of the most rigorous faculty-engagement initiatives in the nation, and a robust publication and touring exhibition program that extends the museum’s reach far beyond its walls. The Tang Teaching Museum’s award-winning building, designed by architect Antoine Predock, serves as a visual metaphor for the convergence of art and ideas. The Museum is open to the public Tuesday–Sunday, noon–5 pm, with extended hours until 9 pm Thursday. https://tang.skidmore.edu