To celebrate the opening of its new wing next May, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts has commissioned from New York wunderkind Ryan McGinness a monumental work based on the museum's collection.

Titled Art History Is Not Linear (VMFA), the painting will measure measure 8 by 32 feet and will be installed in the James W. and Frances G. McGlothlin Wing's entry concourse. True to McGinness's previous work, which often incorporates public signs, corporate logos, and contemporary iconography, the 16-panel work will feature 200 iconographs based on objects in the VMFA's collection and will offer visitors a preview of what can be seen in the new wing. McGinness told the museum’s curator of modern and contemporary art that the piece, his first site-specific work and the first to take as its subject matter a museum's collection, represents a major change for him. “I don’t really like art about art,” he said. “I really don’t like ‘inside’ art.” The project was funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts Fund for American Art.