HANK WILLIS THOMAS AT ROCKEFELLER CENTER
Art Production Fund and Rockefeller Center are pleased to announce the latest Art in Focus program by New York-based artist Hank Willis Thomas. Thomas’ work will transform the public spaces of Rockefeller Center with richly patterned quilts made of sports jerseys and sculptures inspired by athletic symbolism.
Thomas’ work will be on view from July 6 through October 6, 2026. Viewers will discover Thomas’ work in the public spaces of 45 Rockefeller Plaza, 30 Rockefeller Plaza, 50 Rockefeller Plaza, 10 Rockefeller Plaza, and 1 Rockefeller Plaza.
This Art in Focus exhibition coincides with the celebration of the FIFA World Cup 26™ and will be on display during the official NYNJ World Cup 26 & Telemundo Fan Village at Rockefeller Center from July 6 through July 19, 2026.
Hank Willis Thomas lives and works in Brooklyn, NY, working across a range of media including photography, sculpture, screen-printing, neon, mixed media, and installation art. His work explores themes of perspective, identity, commodity, media, and popular culture. This exhibition highlights the artist’s longstanding interest in sports, emphasizing the intersection of identity, athletics, and politics. With baseball, basketball, and soccer at the forefront, the works on view examine the powerful role these games have played throughout history and in society today.
Drawing on quilt traditions of the African American South, Thomas uses sports jerseys as the primary medium throughout the exhibition. The jerseys invite viewers to consider the bodies that have historically worn these uniforms, addressing the visual systems that have helped perpetuate inequality. Deconstructed and reassembled, the jerseys are transformed into art historical references, abstract patterns, and silhouettes of celebrated athletes. One example of this is in Thomas’ That’s Game (2021), an outdoor mural of 50 Rockefeller Plaza that reimagines the NBA’s current logo in jerseys from All-Star players throughout the league’s history.
At 45 Rockefeller Plaza, a large-scale vinyl installation features Guernica (2016), a mural-size quilt with dynamic composition and colorful jerseys, inspired by Pablo Picasso’s monumental 1937 painting of the same name. By engaging with European artists including Picasso and Matisse, both who drew on early twentieth-century modernist appropriations of African art, Thomas links the politics of sports and war with the politics of art and art history.
Embedded within the lobby vitrines of 45 Rockefeller Plaza are sculptures from Thomas’s Punctum series, which portray powerful gestures by athletes. Visitors are invited to experience the weight and significance of a single detail from a scene recreated at life-size scale. Sculptural works include Liberty (2015) and Perseverance (2017), presented in dialogue with imagery from Thomas’s two-dimensional works. The sculptures are installed within vitrines wrapped in images of Thomas’ quilted baseball and basketball jerseys, as well as a background detail from Thomas’s retroreflective artwork Success is no accident (2026). A screenprint on retroreflective vinyl incorporating archival photographs of Jackie Robinson, “This ain't fun. But you watch me, I'll get it done.” (blue, gold, red, white on blue), (2026), is displayed in the center baseball-themed vitrine.
As part of the presentation, Hank Willis Thomas and Art Production Fund will host a free and public children’s art-making workshop on site at Rockefeller Center on Saturday, July 11 from 2 pm-4:20pm as part of the ongoing Art Sundae program. Inspired by the sports themed works of Hank Willis Thomas, children will create their own mixed-media collages to be displayed at Rockefeller Center as part of a public art exhibition.
"There's no better place to think about what unites us than Rockefeller Center during the World Cup. Sport has this rare power to hold a mirror up to who we are — our histories, our heroes, our hopes. I hope these works give people a reason to look up, and look closer, at the games we love." - HANK WILLIS THOMAS
“We are thrilled to present the work of Hank Willis Thomas, whose installation fluently unites the worlds of art and sport. His long standing public art practice, and layered multimedia works come at a perfect time when sports including soccer, basketball and baseball command attention across New York City.” - CASEY FREMONT, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ART PRODUCTION FUND
“Rockefeller Center is not only a place where fans can come together and find a community for world sporting events, but also an iconic cultural destination for public art. Thomas’ installation builds upon that energy linking the worlds of sport and art in a meaningful presentation that will elevate fans' experience across campus.”- EB KELLY, HEAD OF ROCKEFELLER CENTER AND SENIOR MANAGING DIRECTOR, TISHMAN SPEYER
HANK WILLIS THOMAS (b. 1976 Plainfield, NJ) lives and works in Brooklyn, NY as a conceptual artist working primarily with themes related to perspective, identity, commodity, media, and popular culture. His work has been exhibited throughout the United States and abroad including the International Center of Photography, Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Musée du quai Branly, Hong Kong Arts Centre and the Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art.
His collaborative projects include Question Bridge: Black Males, In Search Of The Truth (The Truth Booth), The Writing on the Wall, and For Freedoms. In 2017, For Freedoms was awarded the ICP Infinity Award for New Media and Online Platform. Thomas is a recipient of the Gordon Parks Foundation Fellowship (2019), The Guggenheim Fellowship (2018), AIMIA | AGO Photography Prize (2017), Soros Equality Fellowship (2017), Aperture West Book Prize (2008), Renew Media Arts Fellowship from the Rockefeller Foundation (2007), and the New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship Award (2006). He is also a former member of the Public Design Commission for the City of New York.
In 2019, Thomas unveiled his permanent work "Unity" in Brooklyn, NY. In 2017, “Love Over Rules” permanent neon was unveiled in San Francisco, CA and “All Power to All People” in Opa Locka, FL. Thomas holds a B.F.A. from New York University, New York, NY (1998) and an M.A./M.F.A. from the California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA (2004). He received honorary doctorates from the Maryland Institute of Art, Baltimore, MD and the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts, Portland, ME in 2017.
ART IN FOCUS is a multidisciplinary program that showcases installations by contemporary artists inspired by the New York City landscape and contemporary life. Artists featured in the series will have their work displayed in a number of prominent and unexpected public locations throughout Rockefeller Center. Art in Focus is presented in partnership with Rockefeller Center and Art Production Fund, a non-profit organization dedicated to commissioning and producing ambitious public art projects, reaching new audiences, and expanding awareness through contemporary art. Past Art in Focus artists include Joana Avillez, Hein Koh, Portia Munson, LaKela Brown, Lucy Sparrow, Angelica Hicks, Vanessa German, Ryan Flores, Genevieve Gaignard, Oliver Jeffers, Hiba Schahbaz, Sanford Biggers, Hilary Pecis, Maurice Harris, Lisa Congdon, Max Colby, Hugo McCloud, Emily Mullin, Arghavan Khosravi, Lorraine Nam, Joel Gaitan, Basil Kincaid, Dominique Fung, Debbie Lawson, Melissa Joseph, Joel Mesler, Shantell Martin, Jake Clark, Will Cotton, Greg Ito, Julia Chiang, Cynthia Talmadge, and Kelly Wall.
ROCKEFELLER CENTER is a global icon in the heart of New York City. Conceived by John D. Rockefeller Jr. as a “city within the city,” the Center comprises 13 buildings connected by an underground concourse. Under the stewardship of owner and operator Tishman Speyer, the Center has become the city's most dynamic place to work, play, dine, shop, and celebrate. Rockefeller Center offers an outdoor, public museum experience with more than 100 permanent art works across campus along with rotating exhibitions and the gallery at legendary auction house Christie’s. Visitors can join an official Rockefeller Center group or private VIP tour to learn about the campus’s art, architecture, and history. For more information or to purchase tickets to attractions and programs, visit rockefellercenter.com.
ART PRODUCTION FUND is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to commissioning and producing ambitious public art projects, reaching new audiences and expanding awareness through contemporary art. Past projects include: Elmgreen & Dragset, “Prada Marfa,” Valentine, TX; Ugo Rondinone, “Seven Magic Mountains,” Las Vegas; Jeff Koons, “Seated Ballerina,” Rockefeller Center, NYC; Zoe Buckman, “CHAMP,” LA; Raul de Nieves “When I Look In To Your Eyes I See the Sun,” Miami; Nancy Baker Cahill “Liberty Bell”, multiple cities; Sanford Biggers “Oracle”, Rockefeller Center, NYC and Hammer Museum, LA; Derrick Adams “Funtime Unicorns”, Rockefeller Center, NYC. Frieze Projects LA 2023-2026, LA. www.artproductionfund.org
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