The contemporary art department represents 1,304 artists and 4,869 artworks. Where are these artists and artworks from? Below are maps of both the artists and the artworks by nationality. While the maps are similar, there are some striking distinctions. Interacting with the map by hovering over the country will show you the number or artists and artworks associated with that country. You’ll notice that the correlation between the number of artworks and the number of artists varies by country. For example, the collection has one artist from Algeria and one artist from Serbia, but the collection features 15 pieces from the Serbian artist and only one from the Algerian artist. Similarly, the collection has two artists from Iran, Colombia, and Vietnam, but the number of artworks varies, with 23 artworks coming from the Iranian artists, 7 artworks from the Colombian artists, and 2 artworks from the Vietnamese artists.

The issue of representation, then, is nuanced by volume of artworks versus artists. Could 15 artworks from one Serbian artist represent a commitment to that one artist as opposed to Serbian art in general? Is having 13 artists contribute one piece each any different or better, as seen in the case of Canada?

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Overwhelmingly though, the maps indicate that the majority of the artists and artworks are coming from the United States, with 721 artists and 2,640 artworks. That represents 55.3% of the artists and 54.2% of the artworks. While the volume of artwork from the United States may seem high compared to any other particular country, nearly half the collection is from outside of the United States, suggesting a concerted effort to collect from around the world more generally.

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Suppressing the United States from the data is able to give a clearer picture of the distribution of nationalities represented in the collection outside of the United States. CMOA’s strongest holdings are in Japanese art, followed mostly by art by artists from western Europe. Australia is the first country to leave Europe after Japan, and is the 14th most collected nationality outside of the United States. Accordingly, while CMOA has stronger Japanese holdings (comprising 8.67% of their overall collection), when it comes to collecting artworks from nationalities from outside of the United States, they collect most actively in Europe, with their first 12 European countries alone comprising 31.02% of the overall collection.

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