Tufts University Art Galleries opens the Kenneth Tam exhibition “Standing in Soft Formation.” Through his choreographed video, photography and sculpture, Tam has long explored the myths and performative culture that uphold conventional American expectations of masculinity and identity. “Standing in Soft Formation” features the artist’s two most recent projects — “Silent Spikes” (2021) and “The Founding of the World” (2023) — in dialogue for the first time. The two installations explore historical and present-day tropes of Anglo-American masculinity and their impact on Asian American identities first through the invisible migrant labor that fueled the 19th-century dream of the American West, and then through the fraught rituals of the college fraternity.

The exhibition will be on view during regular gallery hours, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday, through April 21. An opening reception with the artists will be held this evening (January 24) from 6 to 8 p.m.