The Exhibition Program was established to support the creation of new work and to give greater exposure to contemporary artists. In 1981 J. Patrick Lannan, Sr. founded the Lannan Museum in Lake Worth, Florida. Housed in a renovated Art Deco movie theatre, the museum building was designed to provide an environment for the presentation of selections from the collection as well as temporary exhibitions. Artists presented at the Lannan Museum included Greg Colson, Kathy Muehlemann, Ed Ruscha, and James Turrell.
After the foundation relocated to Los Angeles in July 1990, new galleries were inaugurated with presentations of paintings by German artist Gerhard Richter and a monumental sculpture, The Tables, by New York-based artist Tom Otterness. Subsequent exhibitions included work by artists Siah Armajani, Chris Burden, Chuck Close, Lynn Davis, Robert Frank, Gary Simmons, and Bill Viola among a number of thematic group presentations.
Since 1997, when the Foundation’s offices were relocated from Los Angeles to Santa Fe, New Mexico, more than 20 exhibitions have been presented at the Lannan Gallery, including works by Guy Tillim, Uta Barth, James Turrell, Morris Louis, and Jean-Luc Mylayne, among others. Between two to three exhibitions are presented to the public each year. These exhibitions feature both historic and newly acquired artworks from the Lannan Collection and vary between solo and thematic group selections.