It is the perfect time of year to take in one (or all) of the terrific art exhibitions open around town. Admission for three of the four museums below is free with your MIT ID; for the Museum of Fine Arts, you can borrow passes from Hayden Library that will get you in for free. For each of the shows below, we also have books that might help provide some context before you go. Some are closing soon, so don’t miss your chance!

Corita Kent and the Language of Pop
Harvard Art Museums
Explore pop art through the lens of the work of Corita Kent — including her 1971 “rainbow swash” design for the Boston Gas (National Grid) tank near I-93. Take a look at the exhibition catalog in Rotch Library to learn more about Sister Corita, printmaking, and pop art.
Through January 3
Free admission with an MIT ID

Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933-1957
The Institute of Contemporary Art
Students and faculty at this influential and experimental school included Josef and Anni Albers, Jacob Lawrence, Ilya Bolotowsky, Ruth Asawa, Willem de Kooning, Buckminster Fuller, Trude Guermonprez, Robert Motherwell, John Cage, and Merce Cunningham. For more information, see Black Mountain College: Experiment in Art, one of the many books about Black Mountain College at Rotch Library.
Through January 24
Free admission with an MIT ID

 

Marilyn Arsem: 100 Ways to Consider Time
Museum of Fine Arts
Boston-based performance artist Arsem will be present in the gallery for six hours a day, every day, for 100 days. If you go, be sure to share your experience of time (via letter, e-mail, Twitter, or Instagram) so it can become part of the documentation of the performance and possibly be published by the MFA. To get in the mood, consider reading Rotch Library’s copy of Performance and Temporalisation: Time Happens, edited by Stuart Grant, Jodie McNeilly, and Maeva Veerapen.
Through February 19
MFA passes available at Hayden Library

Ornament & Illusion: Carlo Crivelli of Venice
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
This exhibition brings attention to this often overlooked 15th–century painter. The website itself is interesting because it digitally reassembles one of Crivelli’s altarpieces. For background and analysis of Crivelli’s work, check out Rotch Library’s copy of Ronald Lightbrown’s book on the painter.
Through January 25
Free admission with an MIT ID