Immersing viewers in the world of hip-hop through contemporary art and fashion, The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century brings together contemporary artists, musicians, designers and stylists to tell the story of the art form and its global impact on visual culture. On view now at the Art Gallery of Ontario through April 6, 2025.

Organized on the occasion of Hip Hop’s fiftieth anniversary and featuring contemporary art by some of today’s most important and celebrated artists, including Derrick Adams, John Edmonds, Deana Lawson and Hank Willis Thomas, this dynamic and wide-ranging exhibition highlights the art form’s ongoing conceptual and material innovation. Placing fashion, consumer marketing, music, videos and objects in dialogue with paintings, sculpture, poetry, photography and multi-media installations, the exhibition considers activism and racial identity, notions of bling and swagger, as well as gender, sexuality and feminism.

Artwork credit: Hank Willis Thomas, Black Power, 2008. Lightjet print, 62.2 x 100.3 cm. © Hank Willis Thomas. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York.