Ruth Asawa, Retrospective, SFMOMA
Imogen Cunningham, Untitled (Ruth Asawa holding a looped wire sculpture), sepia-toned gelatin silver print., 1952
The Mother of All Exhibitions - Ruth Asawa
By: Kelly Jean Egan
Entering Ruth Asawa: Retrospective at SFMOMA feels like stepping inside a living sketch—one where delicate lines of wire drift in the air, weaving light and shadow into quiet conversations about space, nature, and belonging. Rather than simply presenting Asawa’s works as static masterpieces, the show breathes with her spirit of openness: her home life, her belief in community arts, and her fascination with organic growth all spill across the galleries in surprising ways. It’s an exhibition that gently asks us to see art and life not as separate pursuits but as an ongoing, intertwined gesture—forms within forms, extending outward in ever-expanding loops.
At a time when the creative contributions of women and artists of color are once again under threat of being sidelined or erased, this retrospective feels all the more urgent and necessary. Ruth Asawa’s story is not simply one of artistic innovation but of quiet resistance: an artist shaped by US imposed internment during WWII, dismissed for the domesticity of her life and the modest materials she chose, yet unwavering in her belief that art could bind people and places together. To revisit her work now is to be reminded that radical beauty can be both delicate and resilient—that art rooted in care and collectivity can leave a legacy more enduring than monuments of stone. In giving Asawa this expansive platform, SFMOMA invites us to see how her vision still ripples outward, asking what it means to nurture creative communities today.
In the central galleries, clusters of Ruth Asawa’s signature wire sculptures hover like floating constellations—hand-looped forms of copper, brass, and steel, suspended in rhythmic succession. Seen together, they speak less as individual objects and more as a living ecosystem of light, shadow, and form. The retrospective emphasizes their communal dialogue: how repetition and variation create a sense of both discipline and freedom, restraint and risk. What deepens their impact is the awareness of the labor involved—hours of looping wire while raising children, often in the margins of the day—imbuing these luminous structures with the quiet urgency of a life that refused to separate art from survival. Yet the show doesn’t romanticize this labor; instead, it honors the grit and endurance that shaped works so seemingly weightless.
Ruth Asawa, multiple hanging wire sculptures, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art Restrospective, 2025
One of the standout works from Asawa’s paper studies is Untitled (WC.187, Two Watermelons) (1960s), rendered in ink on technical paper. The piece depicts two overlapping watermelons, their striped surfaces built from repeated, deliberate marks that feel both methodical and organic. Measuring modestly yet commanding attention through its precision, the work reflects Asawa’s interest in structure and pattern without resorting to strict realism. The use of technical paper emphasizes her experimental approach—blending everyday materials with fine art sensibility—while the subject matter, drawn from daily life, reinforces her ability to find complexity in the ordinary. As a result of being wet, the paper morphs, thus creating an illusion of mass, as though the watermelons have weighed the paper down. Created during a period of balancing artistic practice with domestic life, the drawing reveals how observation and repetition became integral to her process, quietly bridging the gap between study and sculpture.
Ruth Asawa, Untitled (WC.187, Two Watermelons), ink on paper, c. 1960s
Perhaps the most tender — and potentially most complicated — gesture of the retrospective is the recreation of Asawa’s Noe Valley living room. This domestic vignette, complete with her family photographs and a scattering of her children’s artworks, invites visitors to step inside the hum of her everyday life. There’s a genuine warmth to standing in that space: you can almost feel the texture of her world — art and family entangled, no boundary between the two. For parents and artists alike, it’s a moving reminder that creativity can take root at the kitchen table as much as in the studio.
Recreation of Ruth Asawa’s Living Room, Digital Photograph, “Ruth Asawa: Retrospective" exhibition at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), 2025.
Yet there’s also a tension here worth acknowledging. While this recreation beautifully honors the intimacy of her world, it risks leaning too heavily into nostalgia, softening the radical edge of her practice into something almost quaint. It’s a delicate balance — to show the domestic without diminishing the rigor of the art itself. In its best moments, this room does what the entire exhibition aspires to do: remind us that the lines between artist, mother, teacher, and activist were never separate threads for Asawa but part of one continuous form. It’s up to us, as viewers, not to let the coziness of that vision overshadow the strength it took to hold it all together.
Among the paper pieces and wire sculpture works in the retrospective are several of Asawa’s ceramic face masks. Created from the mid-1960s through around 2000, she sculpted and fired hundreds of these small, life-cast portraits of friends, family, students, and community figures. Displayed originally on the exterior of her Noe Valley home, these masks served as both intimate mementos and public markers of connection—each mask capturing a “minute of a person,” in Asawa’s words. Here, in the retrospective, they shift from domestic ritual to archival presence, emphasizing Asawa’s belief that art arises from relationship—not only to materials, but to the people around her. In the context of the wire sculptures and paper works, these faces remind us that her practice was never about ego or isolation—but about gathering, presence, and the quiet declaration that every life is worth casting in clay as art.
Ruth Asawa, various ceramic face masks (c.1960s-2000), “Ruth Asawa: Retrospective" exhibition at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), 2025
What distinguishes this retrospective from previous presentations is its refusal to isolate Asawa as merely a sculptor of ethereal forms. It presents a fuller picture—one that includes early drawings, student work, teaching materials, civic efforts, and family ephemera. The result is not an enigmatic myth of the lone genius, but a portrait of someone who believed art should live in schools, gardens, and neighborhoods. Her practice was porous; her legacy communal.
Ruth Asawa, A display of various wire sculptures, Ruth Asawa Retrospective, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 2025
Ruth Asawa, Untitled (PF.293 Bouquet from Anni Albers), ink on paper, c. early 1990s
It’s that expanded scope that gives this retrospective real weight: instead of elevating her as an isolated figure of genius. By honoring that breadth, SFMOMA has created a retrospective that feels not just overdue but urgent. It gives us a model of what artistic influence can look like when rooted in generosity, resistance and collective growth. The show doesn’t just elevate Asawa—it invites us to consider how we value care, labor, and interdependence in creative life.
Gallery room, Digital Photograph, “Ruth Asawa: Retrospective" exhibition at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), 2025.
