Inaugural Presentation of ICA’s New Artist and Research Residency Includes Sculptures, Installation, and Performances by the Philadelphia-Based Artist

This fall, the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania (ICA Philadelphia) presents the first solo museum exhibition of Philadelphia-based artist Wilmer Wilson IV, including new and recent work spanning performance, site-specific installation, sculpture, and works on paper. On view September 26, 2026, through February 21, 2027, Wilmer Wilson IV: SKIRL! focuses on the Eastern Gray Squirrel, an animal shaped by the ecological and colonial histories of the East Coast, as a lens for examining American identity, history, and urban space.

SKIRL! marks the launch of R+D, ICA’s first formal artist residency program, under the new leadership of Daniel W. Dietrich, II Director Johanna Burton. Expanding ICA’s commitment to radical experimentation and scholarship production, R+D supports artists in developing new work through a sustained, exploratory process that leverages the resources of the University of Pennsylvania and the city of Philadelphia. R+D activates the museum as a live laboratory, championing intellectual risk-taking and collaborative research over traditional exhibition-making.“This exhibition embodies ICA’s mission at every level,” said Burton.“As the first presentation of our R+D residency, it foregrounds process over product, inviting audiences into a practice of curiosity and experimentation that is still unfolding. Wilmer’s research moves fluidly across urban ecology, American political history, animal studies, and performance, and it demonstrates exactly the kind of intellectual risk-taking this program was created to support.”

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