Des Moines Art Center

Topography (drawn from the Ancient Greek words topos, meaning place, and graphia, meaning writing) is the creation of a visual map that describes the natural or human-made features of a place. Humans have long used the process of mapmaking to make sense of the world around us. Mapping can create order out of vast amounts of information, help us to extrapolate broader patterns, or reveal how unseen systems influence our perceptions.
The artists in this exhibition have coopted this practice to their own ends. Some seek to record the impact of humans on our surroundings, documenting the changes wrought upon the natural landscape by ongoing industrialization and suburban sprawl. Others use mapmaking as a starting point for abstract artistic experimentation, transforming cartographic information into meditations on shape and color. Still others consider how mapmaking reveals ways geography can be weaponized by institutions, unearthing abuses of power.
In this exhibition, mapping serves as a metaphor for the ways artists draw meaning from their surroundings: how they transform our understanding of both the physical world and the societal forces that shape the places we inhabit.
“Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging” is curated by Associate Curator Beth Gollnick. Andy Goldsworthy (British, born 1956) Prairie Cairn/ For My Father/ Grinnell, Iowa, 2001-2002 Suite of 15 Cibachrome prints and 1 smaller framed title panel Purchased with funds from the Coffin Fine Arts Trust; Nathan Emory Coffin Collection of the Des Moines Art Center, 2002.15.a-.p Photo Credit: Rich Sanders

Local Event: "Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging" June 13 - September 20, 2026

Polk County

Des Moines

Iowa

"Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging"...

Topography (drawn from the Ancient Greek words topos, meaning place, and graphia, meaning writing) is the creation of a visual...

"Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging" June 13 - September 20, 2026

Join the Des Moines Art Center’s June Social Saturday event: Pride and Seek! During Des Moines’ annual <a href="https://capitalcitypride.org/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Capitol City Pride</a> PrideFest, stop by the Art Center for a couple hours of fun, art making, and educational engagement.&nbsp;Enjoy crafts in the Art School studios, a free screening of the “Last American Gay Bar,” a free guided tour, drag king storytime, treats in the Café, and so much more!
<h5>Schedule of Events:</h5>
11:15 – 11:30 am | Storytime, featuring a local Des Moines Drag King! Art School Courtyard 11: 30 am | Screening of the Last American Gay Bar Levitt Auditorium In collaboration with Capitol City Pride, enjoy a full screening of the six-episode docuseries. <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/event/screening-the-last-american-gay-bar/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">More information here.</a> Noon - 12: 15 pm |&nbsp;Tiny Art Hide and Seek Seek out one-of-a-kind mini artworks hidden outside the Des Moines Art Center! Art provided by the Des Moines Public Library’s Tiny Art Show. (Hide-and-Seek is weather dependent, while supplies last) 1 – 2 pm | Guided Tour (all ages) Meet in the Macomber Lobby LGBTQIA+ Artists in the Art Center Collection, guided by Art Center Associate Curator Ashton Cooper
<h5>Drop-in Activities (11 am – 2 pm):</h5>
Museum Galleries Find the Social Saturday interactive Art Cart in the galleries. Macomber Lobby Enjoy the Art Center’s Paint-n-Play station. Art School Studios Explore creativity and your inner artist! Free drawing available in the studio space, as well as a large, temporary community mural art project. Hide-and-Seek Seek out one-of-a-kind mini artworks hidden around the Des Moines Art Center! Art provided by the Des Moines Public Library’s Tiny Art Show. (Hide-and-Seek will not take place in the museum’s art galleries.) Art Center Café Stop by for a sit-down lunch, a delicious la mie pastry; a full hot/cold espresso menu is available. Enjoy music in the courtyard after 1 pm by a special guest invited by the Art Center Café. <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/support/membership/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Art Center members</a> receive a 10% discount in the café every day. Museum Shop Browse the Museum Shop to find gifts and souveniers. <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/support/membership/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">Art Center members</a>&nbsp;get 10% off every day in the Museum Shop. See our special exhibitions before they close! <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/art/exhibitions/henry-payer/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">“Iowa Artists 2026: Henry Payer: Aagakinąk Haciwi: We Live Opposite Each Other”</a> (A.H. Blank Gallery and Krause Atrium) <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/art/exhibitions/christine-rebet/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">“Christine Rebet: Sound of Time”</a> (Pamela Bass-Bookey and Harry Bookey Gallery) <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/art/exhibitions/artists-around-a-table/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">“Artists Around a Table: Artmaking and Merrymaking, 1927-1952”</a> (John Brady Print Gallery)
Social Saturdays occur at the Des Moines Art Center on the second Saturday of the month. This event is free to attend, and no registration is required.

Local Event: Social Saturday: Pride and Seek

Social Saturday: Pride and Seek

Join the Des Moines Art Center’s June Social Saturday event: Pride and Seek! During Des Moines’ annual Capitol City Pride...

Bronx-based photographer Elle Pérez (b. 1989) constructs lush and tactile photographs born from careful attention to the objects, settings, and individuals in their everyday life. The artist’s 2025 series “La Despedida (the world is always ending, the world is always again beginning)” encompasses photographs taken in the gardens of two very different sites: Pérez’s grandfather’s backyard in Puerto Real, Puerto Rico, and Impressionist painter Claude Monet’s home in Giverny, France. In the eleven photographs on view, Pérez deploys close cropping, zooming in on expanses of blooming flowers, lace curtains, and breaking waves.
La despedida means “the farewell,” and the images of Pérez’s grandfather’s home document a visit made by the artist to say a final goodbye to an ailing patriarch. Giverny, too, was the site of Monet’s passing. Yet, as the subtitle indicates, parting is not quite permanent. Goodbyes and endings—browning blooms, sunsets, and ebbing tides—accompany beginnings such as new buds, sunrises, and returning waves. The “ephemeral condition of living,” as Pérez has described it, is enmeshed with the ephemeral condition of dying.
In these images, one layer of visual information is partially masked by another. By blocking full access to the image, the artist prompts a pattern of looking marked by searching, pondering, and imagining. In obscuring just enough detail, Pérez invites observers to use their own experiences, senses, and memories to fill in the blanks, facilitating an embodied connection with the image. In meditating on their departed grandfather’s plantain groves or Monet’s pond of water lilies, Pérez engages with people who are gone through places that were important to them. Because the images are not definitive, explanatory, or didactic, the observer is invited to do the same. Understanding is only ever a partial view.
“Elle Pérez: La Despedida” is curated by Associate Curator Ashton Cooper. Elle Pérez (born 1989) untitled (light window), 2025 Archival pigment print Image courtesy of the artist and 47 Canal, New York Photo: Joerg Lohse

Local Event: "Elle Pérez: La Despedida" on View June 25 - November 29, 2026

"Elle Pérez: La Despedida" on View June 25 -...

Bronx-based photographer Elle Pérez (b. 1989) constructs lush and tactile photographs born from careful attention to the...

"Elle Pérez: La Despedida" on View June 25 - November 29, 2026

Join us for the opening celebrations of <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/art/exhibitions/topographies/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">“Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging”</a> in the Anna K. Meredith Gallery and <a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/art/exhibitions/elle-perez/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">“Elle Pérez: La Despedida”</a> in the A. H. Blank Gallery!
Bring family and friends to view the artwork, and kick off the evening with complimentary lite bites from The Tangerine Food Company. Beer and wine available for purchase (credit only), plus the bar features a specialty matcha cocktail. Remarks from Kelly Baum, John and Mary Pappajohn Director and CEO, will take place at 6 pm.
This event is free; registration is not required. This event will be&nbsp;<a href="https://desmoinesartcenter.org/visitor-policies/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">documented with photography</a>.
Sky Hopinka (Ho-Chunk Nation/Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians, born 1984) “Mnemonics of Shape and Reason” (deatil), 2021 (still) HD video, stereo, color, 4.2 min Des Moines Art Center Permanent Collections; Purchased with funds from the Pamela Bass-Bookey and Harry Bookey Moving-Image and Time-Based Art Fund, 2025.1 © Sky Hopinka. Image appears courtesy of the Artist and The Green Gallery, Milwaukee

Local Event: Exhibitions Celebration: “Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging” and “Elle Pérez: La Despedida"

Exhibitions Celebration: “Topographies: Mapping...

Join us for the opening celebrations of “Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging” in the Anna K. Meredith Gallery and “Elle...

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"Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging" June 13 - September 20, 2026

JUN

13

10:00 AM

Des Moines Art Center, 4700 Grand Ave, Des Moines, IA

Social Saturday: Pride and Seek

JUN

13

11:00 AM

Des Moines Art Center, 4700 Grand Ave, Des Moines, IA

"Elle Pérez: La Despedida" on View June 25 - November 29, 2026

JUN

25

10:00 AM

Des Moines Art Center, 4700 Grand Ave, Des Moines, IA

Exhibitions Celebration: “Topographies: Mapping Being and Belonging” and “Elle Pérez: La Despedida"

JUN

25

5:00 PM

Des Moines Art Center, 4700 Grand Ave, Des Moines, IA