San Francisco February 4, 2025 – The Museum of Craft and Design is pleased to announce Beau McCall: Buttons On! on view May 10–September 14, 2025. Originally organized by Fuller Craft Museum and guest curated by Peter “Souleo” Wright, Buttons On! showcases wearable and visual art from Beau McCall’s nearly forty-year career. Through his art, McCall hand-sews the everyday fastener onto mostly upcycled fabrics, materials, and objects to comment on topics related to pop culture and social justice. Buttons On! showcases McCall’s button-embellished wearable art including jackets, sneakers, jewelry, and durags; visual art such as a 450-pound cast iron bathtub, a life-size Kool-Aid Man; archival materials documenting McCall’s career; and select items of McCall’s button-less works that spotlight his versatility.
“In most minds, buttons are simple, utilitarian objects used to fasten one’s clothes,” McCall explains. “But I use buttons to create wearable and fine art meant to provoke deep consideration and reflection. Through my creations, I want people to engage with the topics of race, class, LGBTQ+ identity and to also find joy and personal connection. Hopefully, viewers are inspired as they consider how an everyday object, in this case, a button can be transformed into art.”
Beau McCall, darkmuskoilegyptiancrystals&floridawater/redpotionno.1, 2014. Photo Credit: Will Howcroft.
This exhibition is organized into four themes exploring “The Button Man’s” mastery of his chosen medium.
Buttons on the Body explores nearly forty years of McCall’s button-embellished wearable art. This section includes a plethora of jackets, vests, yokes, shorts, aprons, sneakers, jewelry, and durags.
Buttons on the Mind features over ten years of visual art created by McCall using buttons as the primary medium. These works demonstrate how McCall has elevated the button from the practical to the conceptual through pieces such as a button-covered cast iron bathtub that suggests a spiritual and ritualistic sanctuary, a large-scale 45-RPM record adapter snap-in insert inspired by The Staple Singers recording of “We The People,” and an installation of over 100 jars of buttons featuring oral history recordings by button collectors.
Buttons on the Soul is a collection of archival materials documenting McCall’s career and evolution. Included are never-before-seen personal photographs, rare press clippings, his sewing supplies, and a replica of the jar of buttons he discovered at the age of 19.
Buttons Off showcases select items from McCall’s forays into wearable and visual art that do not feature clothing buttons, thereby extending his practice into other areas that highlight his boundless creativity.
Beau McCall, headshot. Photo courtesy of Rohit Venkatraman.
“MCD is honored to present Buttons On! to the San Francisco community, as the exhibition’s only venue on the West Coast,” notes Executive Director Nora Atkinson. “McCall’s transformation of discarded buttons into emotionally charged artworks, rooted in Black and queer artistic traditions using humble materials to convey powerful messages, feels every bit as resonant today as it did when he began working in the 1980s. Delving into themes of identity, memory, and resilience, McCall’s art is both a celebration of individuality and community, offering moments of joy and reflection we so deeply need in today’s challenging times.”
Beau McCall: Buttons On! was organized by Fuller Craft Museum and guest curated by Souleo.
Beau McCall: Buttons On! is accompanied by a catalog featuring over 100 full-color images and essays by James Claiborne, Deputy Director for Community Engagement, Barnes Foundation (Philadelphia, PA); Barbara Paris Gifford, Senior Curator of the Museum of Arts and Design (New York, NY); and Petra Slinkard, Director of Curatorial Affairs, The Nancy B. Putnam Curator of Fashion and Textiles, Peabody Essex Museum (Salem, MA). In an intimate and candid interview with Kara Olidge, Associate Director, Collections and Discovery, Getty Research Institute, McCall tells his story in his own words. The catalog will be available for purchase at MCD.
Button On! will be on view at the Museum of Craft and Design from May 10–September 14, 2025. It will then travel to the Mattatuck Museum from October 12, 2025–January 4, 2026, and then the African American Museum in Philadelphia from March 20, 2027–July 11, 2027.
The Museum of Craft and Design’s exhibitions and programs are generously supported by Anonymous, the Windgate Foundation, and Grants for the Arts.
Above Image: Beau McCall, Button Yoke: Sunny, 2020, and Button Eye Patch: Sunny, 2019. Photo courtesy of Will Howcroft.
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Press/Media Preview:
Friday, May 9, 2025 | 5:00 PM–7:00 PM
RSVP to [email protected]
For more information and interview requests:
Sarah Beth Rosales, Marketing and Communications Director, Museum of Craft and Design at [email protected] or 415.773.0303.
About the Artist
Proclaimed by American Craft magazine as “The Button Man,” Beau McCall began his career in New York City’s Harlem neighborhood after arriving from his native Philadelphia with nothing more than a few hundred dollars, a duffel bag, and buttons. Circa 1988, he made his professional debut with wearable art at The Harlem Institute of Fashion (HIF) show for HARLEM WEEK. McCall became an established force within HIF’s collective, presenting at their runway and museum shows through circa 1995. Since then, McCall has added visual art to his portfolio and entered the permanent collections of public institutions, including the Museum of Arts and Design (New York, NY), Philadelphia Museum of Art (Philadelphia, PA), Victoria and Albert Museum (London, UK), The Museum at FIT (New York, NY), and the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (New York, NY). Media outlets featuring McCall and his work include Women’s Wear Daily, PBS, the New York Times, Associated Press, and NPR. For more info: www.BeauMccall.com
About the Curator
Souleo has been hailed as an “Icon of Harlem” (Ruth Millington, art historian and author of Muse) and “Harlem’s Heart & Soul” (NY Daily News). An acclaimed creative, curator, writer, impresario, consultant, and muse he seamlessly merges the worlds of visual art, fashion, literature, media, and the performing arts to document and amplify the stories of the emerging and underrepresented via exhibitions, events, and writing. Souleo has collaborated with noteworthy institutions and brands, including the New York Public Library, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Brooklyn Public Library/Center for Brooklyn History, Museum of Arts and Design, Columbia University, Barnard College, Newark Museum of Art, Stax Museum of American Soul Music, Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art, Nordstrom, and AARP. Souleo’s work has been widely covered in outlets including the Associated Press, NY Times, The New Yorker, New York Magazine/The Cut, ESSENCE, EBONY, and PBS. For more information: SouleoUniverse.com
About the Museum of Craft and Design
The Museum of Craft and Design (MCD) is San Francisco’s only museum devoted to craft and design. Founded in 2004, MCD showcases designers, makers, and artists through an exciting and distinctive series of craft and design-focused exhibitions and public programs. MCD explores the creative process and current perspectives in craft and design through inspired exhibitions and experiential programs. Learn more at sfmcd.org.
