Courtesy of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia.
Florine Stettheimer’s “Picnic at Bedford Hills,” from “Women Modernists in New York” at the Portland Museum of Art.
Best contemporary show “Geoffrey Farmer,” Institute of Contemporary Art.
Best modern show “O’Keeffe, Stettheimer, Torr, Zorach: Women Modernists in New York,” Portland Museum of Art
Best thematic/historical show “Asia in Amsterdam: the Culture of Luxury in the Golden Age,” Peabody Essex Museum
Most ambitious show “Beyond Words: Illuminated Manuscripts in Boston Collections,” McMullen Museum, Houghton Library, and Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Best group show “Explode Every Day: An Inquiry Into the Phenomenon of Wonder,” Mass MoCA
Best Old Master show “Splendor, Myth, and Vision: Nudes From the Prado,” Clark Art Institute
Best folk/craft show “Birds of a Feather,” Shelburne Museum
Best acquisition Frida Kahlo, “Dos Mujeres (Salvadora y Herminia),” Museum of Fine Arts
Best sculpture “Rodin: Transforming Sculpture,” Peabody Essex Museum
Best new museum building Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockland, Maine
Best renovation Yale Center for British Art
Best new permanent installation Song Gallery, Museum of Fine Arts
Sebastian Smee can be reached at sebastian.smee@globe.com.