Bees and People of the North: Art Exhibitions of March 2025

With the return of longer days and softer light, museums worldwide are launching a new season of exhibitions. March 2025 offers an art lover’s feast: from mystical symbolism in Tokyo to Nordic realism brought to France, from Renaissance drawing masters to contemporary reflections on mythology, film, and feminism. And yes, there is an entire exhibition devoted to bees. Whether you are in the mood for luminous altarpieces, avant-garde abstraction, or cinematic worlds, there’s something on view this month that will resonate.

FRANCE

Christian Krohg: The People of the North

Musée d’Orsay, Paris. March 25 – July 27, 2025

This major retrospective introduces international audiences to the Norwegian painter, writer, and journalist Christian Krohg (1852–1925), one of the most influential figures of Nordic realism. Known for his socially engaged themes and humanistic vision, Krohg portrayed the lives of ordinary people with empathy, clarity, and psychological depth.

In the conservative society of late 19th-century Norway, Christian Krohg did the unthinkable: he painted, and then wrote about, a young sex worker. Her name was Albertine — at once a fictional character and a very real reflection of the women Krohg observed in the streets of Kristiania (now Oslo), where prostitution had been legalized but remained socially taboo. The novel Albertine, published in 1886, caused an uproar. It exposed the hypocrisies of the system and the institutional complicity in women’s exploitation — especially by the police and state health inspections. The book was banned almost immediately, and Krohg’s studio was raided by the authorities. But censorship only amplified the impact.

Alongside the novel, Krohg painted Albertine at the Police Doctor’s Office — a stark, emotionally charged image of a young woman undergoing a mandatory medical examination. This was not romanticism. It was realism as protest, art as direct political commentary.

For Krohg, prostitutes weren’t abstract symbols of vice or tragedy. Many were his models, his subjects, and, above all, real women with agency, expression, and complex lives. His goal wasn’t moralizing — it was humanizing.

This exhibition brings together these portraits and narratives — not to sensationalize, but to revisit a moment when a painter dared to confront the social injustices that polite society preferred to keep in the dark.

The exhibition brings together over 100 works, from striking portraits and maritime scenes to his iconic depictions of marginalized individuals—including sex workers, sailors, and the urban poor. With its focus on light, truth, and the dignity of everyday life, Krohg’s art resonates far beyond the North, speaking powerfully to viewers today.

Artemisia. Héroïne de l’art.

Musée Jacquemart-André, Paris. March 19 – August 3, 2025

One of the Baroque era’s most celebrated and boldest painters, Artemisia Gentileschi (1593–c.1656) steps fully into the spotlight in this long-awaited Parisian retrospective. A true master of light and a mistress of drama, Gentileschi was renowned for her powerful depictions of female figures from history and mythology, transforming biblical and classical themes into gripping, emotionally charged narratives.
The exhibition highlights her dramatic use of light and shadow, fierce heroines like Judith, Susanna, and Cleopatra, and the uniquely female perspective she brought to scenes often painted by men. With over 40 major works on display, the show reveals Gentileschi not just as a trailblazing woman, but as a true master of Baroque painting.

GERMANY

Honey Yellow – The Bee in Art from the Renaissance to the Present

⭐Our Favorite

 

Museum Wiesbaden, Germany. March 7 – June 22, 2025

This delightfully unusual exhibition brings the humble bee into the artistic spotlight. Featuring over 200 works spanning six centuries, it traces how this tiny yet mighty creature has inspired painters, sculptors, printmakers, and poets, from the golden bees of Renaissance religious symbolism to buzzing abstractions in modern and contemporary art.

The show explores themes of fertility, labor, divinity, and the fragility of ecosystems. In religious art, bees often symbolize purity, virginity, and divine wisdom, closely associated with the Virgin Mary and the order of monastic life. Their presence in Renaissance painting conveyed moral ideals as well as natural wonder, linking the sacred and the earthly through the quiet work of nature.

The exhibition features works by artists as diverse as Lucas Cranach the Elder, Peter Paul Rubens, Joseph Beuys, and contemporary voices like Cornelia Schleime and Erika Verzutti.

Whether you are enchanted by honeycomb geometry or fascinated by the symbolic sting of bees in political satire, this exhibition offers a sweet and thought-provoking journey through art history’s most golden-winged subject.

 

ITALY

The Art of James Cameron

Museo Nazionale del Cinema, Turin. March 4 – June 16, 2025

Sci-fi lovers, pack your bags! This one’s for you. If you have ever dreamed of diving into Pandora, sinking with the Titanic, or escaping from a Xenomorph, you’ll want to be in Turin this spring.
Step into the world of epic storytelling, cinematic innovation, and deep-sea imagination with this immersive retrospective dedicated to filmmaker James Cameron. From Titanic to Avatar, The Abyss to Aliens, this exhibition explores the visionary artistry and technological breakthroughs that shaped some of the most iconic films of the last four decades.
On display are original concept sketches, detailed models, costumes, props, and behind-the-scenes footage, highlighting how Cameron’s background in illustration and science inspired his world-building. Fans of sci-fi, fantasy, and cinema will find themselves immersed in the mind of a creator whose work bridges art and technology on a blockbuster scale.

AUSTRIA

Leonardo – Dürer: Renaissance Masterpieces on Colored Paper

Albertina Museum, Vienna. March 7 – June 9, 2025

In a rare and visually striking exhibition, the Albertina Museum brings together works by two Renaissance giants: Leonardo da Vinci and Albrecht Dürer. Centered on the theme of drawing on colored paper, the show reveals how artists across Italy and northern Europe explored volume, light, and shadow on blue, green, and beige backgrounds.
Alongside original drawings by Leonardo and Dürer, the exhibition also includes masterpieces by Raphael, Titian, Pisanello, Hans Baldung Grien, and Albrecht Altdorfer. This unprecedented gathering of works offers a fresh view of how paper color influenced artistic decisions and helped bridge the visual worlds of North and South during the Renaissance.

AUSTRALIA

Yayoi Kusama: The Spirit of the Pumpkins Descended into the Heavens

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. March 15 – August 31, 2025

If a warm wind happens to carry you across the globe to far-off Australia, and you suddenly feel the need for a dose of yellow-drenched minimalism with a psychedelic twist – make your way to this spectacular Kusama installation. Her iconic pumpkins and infinite mirror rooms await.

JAPAN

Hilma af Klint: Visionary Abstractions

The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo. March 6 – June 8, 2025

Long before abstraction became a movement, Hilma af Klint was painting the invisible. This expansive exhibition in Tokyo reveals the Swedish artist’s deep spiritual investigations, blending mysticism, geometry, and color into one of the most quietly revolutionary bodies of work in modern art.
Her visionary compositions, some towering meters high, predate Kandinsky and Mondrian, yet remained largely unknown until the 21st century. You can experience her bold, biomorphic forms and delicate symmetry as she intended—in silence, contemplation, and wonder.
Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale.

Joan Miró: The Poetry of Everyday Life

Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum. March 12 – June 16, 2025

Miró’s visual language has often been compared to the way children draw their first figures; simple dots and lines that suddenly form a smiling face. In Russia, there is even a nursery rhyme that goes: “Dot, dot, comma, dash – now a little face is done! Stick, stick, little pickle – now we’ve got a little figure.” Somehow, that rhyme captures the playful magic of Miró’s stars, eyes, and dancing shapes. Celebrated for his playful, poetic imagery and bold use of color, Joan Miró (1893–1983) continues to enchant viewers around the world. This Tokyo exhibition showcases his ability to transform everyday objects and simple forms into dreamlike symbols, drawing from both Catalan tradition and avant-garde experimentation.
Featuring paintings, sculptures, and works on paper, the show emphasizes Miró’s signature style—where stars, birds, and eyes seem to float in fields of luminous blue and red. This is a rare chance to trace the evolution of one of modernism’s most inventive visual languages.

SPAIN

Zurbarán: (Super)natural

Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, Barcelona. March 22 – September 15, 2025

Three paintings. One saint. Infinite stillness.

This powerful exhibition focuses on three rarely shown masterpieces by Francisco de Zurbarán (1598–1664), each depicting Saint Francis of Assisi in moments of solitude, prayer, and transcendence.

One of the most haunting works by Francisco de Zurbarán, Saint Francis Appears to Pope Nicholas V in a Vision, draws from a medieval legend in which the Pope requests to see the incorrupt body of Saint Francis of Assisi, entombed in the crypt of the basilica in Assisi. Instead of a corpse, he encounters a living apparition of the saint – radiating silence, humility, and divine presence. Zurbarán captures this moment not as a miracle of the flesh, but as a deeply spiritual encounter: a reminder that sanctity does not decay. Cloaked in darkness and contemplation, Francis emerges as both a ghost and a guide, bridging the earthly and the eternal.

Zurbarán’s Saint Francises are embody a deep sense of mysticism and sacred presence. Their simplicity is deceptive: each fold of fabric and tilt of the head invites viewers into an interior world of silence and surrender.

Set against the Gothic architecture of the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, the exhibition places these works in intimate dialogue with contemporary interpretations of spirituality, fragility, and faith. It is a small show, but one that echoes with timeless stillness.

UNITED KINGDOM

Siena: The Rise of Painting

National Gallery, London. March 15 – June 30, 2025

If you missed the acclaimed Siena exhibition during its run in New York, you are in luck – this spring it arrives at the National Gallery in London. The show traces the origins of the Sienese school of painting, exploring how artists like Duccio, Simone Martini, and the Lorenzetti brothers helped shape a distinctly poetic and visionary strand of early Renaissance art.

UNITED STATES

Lines of Connection

Art Institute of Chicago. March 29 – July 14, 2025

This group exhibition explores the power of shared gesture and mark-making across cultures and centuries. From Indigenous Australian painting and Japanese calligraphy to abstract expressionism and contemporary drawing, “Lines of Connection” weaves together artistic languages that rely on the most elemental act: drawing a line.
The show emphasizes visual rhythms, repetition, and symbolic gestures, inviting visitors to see how artists communicate with one another across time and space through movement and form.

Saints, Sinners, Lovers, and Fools: 300 Years of Flemish Masterworks

Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA. March 1 – June 30, 2025

We had the chance to see this exhibition last year in Montreal, and trust us, it is absolutely breathtaking!

Now on view in Salem, the show brings together over 150 works of art, including monumental paintings, sculptures, silverwork, books, and maps created in the Southern Netherlands from 1400 to 1700.

The exhibition explores how Flemish artists used art to connect with the divine, celebrate civic pride, and reflect on love, faith, and folly. It is a rare and emotionally rich journey through a world of vibrant color, storytelling, and devotion.

And yes, this is Salem, the town forever associated with the infamous witch trials. What better place to explore saints, sinners, and everything in between?

The Book of Esther in the Age of Rembrandt

The Jewish Museum, New York. March 14 – June 30, 2025

This thoughtful and timely exhibition explores one of the most fascinating biblical heroines – Queen Esther, through the lens of 17th-century Dutch art and Jewish cultural history. Centered around a rare and richly illustrated 17th-century scroll of the Book of Esther, the exhibition places this object in dialogue with paintings, prints, and decorative art from the Dutch Golden Age.
Visitors will discover how the dramatic story of Esther, with its themes of power, survival, and hidden identity, resonated in both Jewish and Christian artistic circles during the time of Rembrandt. The show also reflects on how Esther’s legacy inspires art and storytelling today.

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Whether you are following sacred silence in Barcelona, playful minimalism in Tokyo, or buzzing symbolism in Wiesbaden – March is a month to be curious. And if you cannot hop a plane to Europe or Australia just yet, do not worry: we have got exhibition catalogs from around the world waiting to transport you. Explore our curated selection and bring the museum magic home.