Art Museum To Celebrate Rocky And Famed Statue!

The Philadelphia Art Museum is pleased to announce Rising Up: Rocky and the Making of Monuments, a landmark exhibition opening in the Dorrance Galleries in April 2026. Organized by guest curator Paul Farber, Director and Co-Founder of Monument Lab and host of the acclaimed podcast The Statue from NPR/WHYY, this exhibition will showcase over 150 works by more than 50 artists and artifacts spanning more than 2,000 years in an investigation of the changing role of monuments across time. 

Blending the worlds of art, sports, and popular culture, Rising Up will take on the life of monuments by exploring the profound meanings and mythologies of the Rocky statue.

Through the lens of the Rocky statue, a monument that is inextricably linked with both the art museum and Philadelphia itself, Rising Up will explore how monuments are made and remade by artists, by communities, and by time, opening the door for conversations on deeper themes of memory, identity, power, and representation in public art. The exhibition will feature work made from antiquity to the present, spotlighting the under told stories around the statue—of Philadelphia’s boxing legends, immigrant neighborhoods, and the fight for the future of public spaces.

Researched for over five years and in development for the last two years, Rising Up will include monumental sculptures, paintings, video performances, film clips, photographs, prints, drawings, new commissions, ephemera, and participatory experiences. Among the featured artists will be Keith Haring, Rashid Johnson, Delilah Montoya, Tavares Strachan, Hank Willis Thomas, Kara Walker, Andy Warhol, Carrie Mae Weems, and makers from Mural Arts Philadelphia’s Restorative Justice Program. The accompanying publication, edited by Farber, includes contributions from celebrated Philadelphia artist Alex Da Corte, former Philadelphia Eagle and Super Bowl champion Malcolm Jenkins, and noted film critic Carrie Rickey.

“The Rocky statue is the most visited and photographed public artwork in Philadelphia, attracting nearly as many annual visitors as the Statue of Liberty,” said Louis Marchesano, the Marion Boulton “Kippy” Stroud Deputy Director of Curatorial Affairs and Conservation. “Rising Up is an opportunity for the art museum to reframe the narrative around Rocky and the steps, placing it in the context of Philadelphia’s civic and cultural identity. We are thrilled to work with Philadelphia thought leader Paul Farber to approach this topic with criticality and imagination, bringing a fresh take on a storied debate about the role of monuments outside the museum, in Philadelphia, and beyond.”

“I am honored to curate this exhibition in my hometown at this moment of cultural urgency and much-needed public discourse,” said Paul Farber. “The steps outside the museum are a site of pilgrimage and the ultimate people’s pedestal. Rising Up asks why millions of people each year visit a statue of the most famous Philadelphian who never lived as a way to better understand our complex and vital relationships to our public monuments.”

Timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the premiere of the Academy Award-winning Rocky film, as well as Philadelphia's hosting of World Cup matches and Semiquincentennial activities, Rising Up will be supported by an opening pay-what-you-wish weekend program and an expansive calendar of community engagement opportunities.

“I am thrilled to celebrate the announcement of the historic Rising Up exhibition in 2026 at the Philadelphia Art Museum,” said Mayor Cherelle L. Parker. “This show is a testament to the vitality and passion of Philadelphia’s arts, culture, and sports communities. Rising Up explores the city’s relationship to its many statues, the artists who create them, and the many neighborhoods where these statues exist. It is more than timely as we approach our monumental Semiquincentennial year.”