Lehman College Art Gallery and The Gallery at Heimbold Visual Arts Center at Sarah Lawrence
College are pleased to present Does This Taste Funny?, a sweeping two-venue group exhibition
showcasing the work of 41 contemporary artists. Opening in September 2026, the exhibition
marks a collaboration between Sarah Lawrence College, where co-curator John O'Connor is
faculty in the Visual and Studio Arts Program, and Lehman College, CUNY, where co-curator
Melissa Brown teaches in the Department of Art.

Does This Taste Funny? explores humor in contemporary art as a generative method for shifting
perception. While humor in art is often mistaken for a lack of seriousness, other fields treat
laughter as anything but trivial: developmental psychologists read early laughter as evidence of
a mind forming expectations about the world, political theory recognizes the joke as a tool of
dissent, and linguists study the punchline as a window into how meaning is built. Within this
framework, the participating artists actively embrace humor to disarm viewers and bypass
intellectual defenses.