Events

    2023 Oct 21

    Spotlight Tour: Sensing the Divine, with Hanna Carney '25

    2:00pm to 2:50pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Hanna Carney ’25 will look at multisensory religious experiences as portrayed in art and the significant role they play in people’s lives. Featured works include a bronze ritual wine vessel (late 11th–early 10th century BCE), cast in China during the Zhou dynasty, and The Miracle of the Sacred Fire, Church of the Holy Sepulchre (1892–99), an ambitious painting by Englishman William Holman Hunt, based on his multiple trips to the Holy Land. Emerging from Carney’s studies of comparative religion and the history of art and architecture, the tour encourages visitors to embrace...

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    2023 Oct 21

    Teen Saturdays at the Museum! / ¡Sábados de Jóvenes en el Museo!

    1:00pm to 3:30pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Museum of Natural History (26 Oxford Street) and Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology (11 Divinity Avenue)

    Teen Saturdays is designed for Latino high school students. Workshops delve into four fascinating traditional celebrations from Central America. Participants will embark on a journey to discover diverse festivals that shape societies in El Salvador, Honduras, Costa Rica, and Guatemala. During each workshop, teenagers will visit exhibits, use art and language to create original works, and challenge their sense of what a tradition can be through discussion. We will learn about the historical and social contexts behind these festivities, their cultural symbolism, and the values they embody...

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    2023 Oct 21

    Augmented Reality Maya Chocolate Plate

    11:00am to 1:00pm

    Location: 

    Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, 11 Divinity Ave., Cambridge

    "Shrink" yourself down to "walk" into an ancient Maya vessel using augmented reality! Maya women were often essential for uniting kingdoms. When a marriage was arranged between Maya royal families, kings would exchange gifts like this ceramic three-legged plate for serving chocolate. Use the museum's iPad as a "magic window" to discover fine details on one such plate that cannot be seen on the actual artifact. A gallery facilitator will guide you through the experience and will share more about the Maya.

    This is a drop-in activity for International Archaeology Day — no...

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    2023 Oct 21

    Spotlight Tour: Sightseeing, with Soleil Saint-Cyr '25

    11:00am to 11:50am

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Soleil Saint-Cyr ’25 will explore urban landscapes and how interactions between public and private spaces shape people’s experiences. The stops on the tour include Four Stops (2007), a large acrylic painting by Nina Chanel Abney; a tile panel with flowers and serrated leaves (c. 1570), an architectural element from Ottoman Turkey; and Head of an Oba, a sculpture from 1525–75 that belongs to the group of “Benin Bronzes,” which were taken from Benin City as part of the British Punitive Expedition of 1897.

    No registration required.

    ...

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    2023 Oct 19

    Astronomy is for All of Us: Celebrating Women Astrophysicists and the History of Cosmic Discovery

    5:00pm to 8:00pm

    Location: 

    Harvard College Observatory Plate Stacks, 47 Concord Ave., Cambridge

    During Massachusetts STEM Week, join us for an evening celebrating remarkable women in astronomy from across the galaxy. Enjoy a dynamic lecture on exciting applications of astronomy, explore a captivating exhibition in the Great Refractor, engage in family-friendly STEM activities, and cap off the night with fall refreshments and stargazing.

    • Remarks from Professor Lisa Kewley, Director, Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian
    • Welcome remarks from Lt. Governor Kim Driscoll, highlighting...
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    2023 Oct 18

    Bosco Sodi in Dialogue

    6:00pm to 7:15pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    Join us for a discussion with Bosco Sodi about his sculpture installation Origen, which marks the first outdoor public art display for the Harvard Art Museums. Mary Schneider Enriquez, former Houghton Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Harvard Art Museums, will talk with Bosco Sodi about his practice, the ideas central to Origen, and the placement of his work outside as well as in galleries featuring Buddhist sculpture and funerary art.

    No registration required.

    ...

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    2023 Oct 18

    Gallery Talk—Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade

    12:30pm to 1:00pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    Join curator Sarah Laursen for a closer look at artworks in the exhibition Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade (September 15, 2023–January 14, 2024). The exhibition explores the entwined histories of the opium trade and the Chinese art market between the late 18th and early 20th centuries. Laursen will share how these two commodities—acquired through both legal and illicit means—have had a lasting impact on the global economy, public health, immigration law, education, and the arts.

    ...

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    2023 Oct 15

    Spotlight Tour: Sightseeing, with Soleil Saint-Cyr '25

    2:00pm to 2:50pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Soleil Saint-Cyr ’25 will explore urban landscapes and how interactions between public and private spaces shape people’s experiences. The stops on the tour include Four Stops (2007), a large acrylic painting by Nina Chanel Abney; a tile panel with flowers and serrated leaves (c. 1570), an architectural element from Ottoman Turkey; and Head of an Oba, a sculpture from 1525–75 that belongs to the group of “Benin Bronzes,” which were taken from Benin City as part of the British Punitive Expedition of 1897.

    No registration required.

    ...

    Read more about Spotlight Tour: Sightseeing, with Soleil Saint-Cyr '25
    2023 Oct 15

    Spotlight Tour: Women’s Health and Art, with Eve Crompton '24

    11:00am to 11:50am

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    In this tour, Eve Crompton ’24 will analyze historical social attitudes toward female health and illness as she examines a selection of representations of women in art. She will look at an Attic grave stele, Woman dying in childbirth (c. 330 BCE); the painting Mother and Child (c. 1901), which Pablo Picasso was inspired to make after visiting a French prison hospital; and Erich Heckel’s painting To the Convalescent Woman (Triptych) (1912–13). An integrative biology student, Crompton aims to address the health inequalities perpetuated by structural barriers and individual prejudices,...

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    2023 Oct 14

    Spotlight Tour: Out of This World, with Arielle Frommer '25

    2:00pm to 2:50pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Arielle Frommer ’25 will explore the intersection of art and astronomy in three works: Light Prop for an Electric Stage [Light-Space Modulator] (1930), a reflective kinetic sculpture by László Moholy-Nagy, who had been a professor at the Bauhaus in Germany; Prince Shōtoku at Age Two (datable to about 1292), an iconic Buddhist sculpture from Japan; and The Gare Saint-Lazare: Arrival of a Train (1877), a large canvas that Claude Monet painted in Paris, soon after he began painting in the Impressionist style. An astrophysics student, Frommer will ask, “How does our...

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    2023 Oct 14

    Water Stories with the Artist Atul Bhalla

    1:00pm

    Location: 

    Johnson-Kulukundis Family Gallery, Byerly Hall, 8 Garden St., Cambridge

    Join the curator Jinah Kim and the artist Atul Bhalla for a tour of Water Stories: River Goddesses, Ancestral Rites, and Climate Crisis and a discussion of the artwork I was Not Waving but Drowning II.

    After years of observing ecological deterioration and alienation of the river from urban communities, Atul Bhalla ritualistically submerged himself in the Yamuna River, alluringly captured in the set of fourteen serial photographs on loan from the Harvard Art Museums. Kim and Bhalla will discuss this work and its context within the gallery.

    ...

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    2023 Oct 14

    Exhibition Tour: Seeing in Art and Medicine

    12:00pm to 1:00pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    Join curator Jen Thum and radiologist Hyewon Hyun for a tour of the exhibition Seeing in Art and Medicine, on view from September 2 to December 30, 2023. Thum and Hyun will share insights about the museums’ medical humanities program for radiologists—on which the exhibition is based—the curatorial process, and what can be gleaned through close looking.

    No registration required.

    ...

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    2023 Oct 14

    Spotlight Tour: Paths to Abstraction, with Isa Haro ’24

    11:00am to 11:50am

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Isa Haro ’24 will explore how abstraction in art has been practiced, viewed, and enjoyed over time, with three very different examples. She will look at a group of Ming dynasty garden rocks (16th–17th century), which served as focal elements in traditional gardens; Paul Cézanne’s Study of Trees (c. 1904), a radically austere painting that contributed to Cézanne’s renown as a pivotal figure in the history of abstraction; and Alberto Burri’s Legno e rosso 3 (1956), a painting made with lacquered bark and a blowtorch. An art, film, and visual studies student, Haro aims to...

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    2023 Oct 12

    Art, Data, and Surveillance: A Colloquium

    6:00pm to 7:15pm

    Location: 

    Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford St., Cambridge

    In this conversation, Simone Browne and Mimi Ọnụọha will examine how artists have critically grappled with the hidden infrastructures of surveillance today, and explore the consequences of what is made visible through data.

    A reception will follow in the related Surveillance exhibition at the Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments, Harvard Science Center, 1 Oxford Street, second floor, Cambridge, MA, from 7:30­pm–8:15pm.

    ...

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    2023 Oct 12

    Gallery Talk: Seeing in Art and Medicine

    12:30pm to 1:00pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    Join curatorial fellow Sarah Lieberman for an exploration of works in the exhibition Seeing in Art and Medicine, on view from September 2 to December 30, 2023. Lieberman will share insights about the museums’ medical humanities program for radiologists—on which the exhibition is based—and what can be gleaned through close looking.

    Learn more and RSVP.

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    2023 Oct 11

    Solidarity! Exhibition Gallery Tour

    10:00am

    Location: 

    Lia and William Poorvu Gallery, Schlesinger Library, 3 James St., Cambridge

    Join a tour of the Solidarity! Transnational Feminisms Then and Now exhibition led by student guides and staff from the Schlesinger Library.

    Solidarity! Transnational Feminisms Then and Now features 50 years of transnational feminist collections held at the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America. Through a rich array of materials—including posters, newspapers, photographs, and memorabilia—the exhibition explores the promises and limits of global feminist solidarity, while highlighting the key role of iconography in transnational feminist and...

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    2023 Oct 10

    Curator-Led Exhibition Tour: At the Limits of the Book

    5:30pm to 6:00pm

    Location: 

    Houghton Library, Harvard Yard, Cambridge

    Join exhibition curator and Houghton librarian Molly Schwartzburg for a special guided tour of At the Limits of the Book: Bindings from the Houghton Library Collections. This 45-minute tour will include discussion of the themes of the exhibition, highlights from the materials on display, and ample time for participant questions.

    Learn more and RSVP.

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    2023 Oct 08

    Spotlight Tour: Out of This World, with Arielle Frommer '25

    2:00pm to 2:50pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Arielle Frommer ’25 will explore the intersection of art and astronomy in three works: Light Prop for an Electric Stage [Light-Space Modulator] (1930), a reflective kinetic sculpture by László Moholy-Nagy, who had been a professor at the Bauhaus in Germany; Prince Shōtoku at Age Two (datable to about 1292), an iconic Buddhist sculpture from Japan; and The Gare Saint-Lazare: Arrival of a Train (1877), a large canvas that Claude Monet painted in Paris, soon after he began painting in the Impressionist style. An astrophysics student, Frommer will ask, “How does our...

    Read more about Spotlight Tour: Out of This World, with Arielle Frommer '25
    2023 Oct 08

    Spotlight Tour: Seeing in Art and Medicine, with Genesis Nam '24

    11:00am to 11:50am

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Genesis Nam ’24 will put visitors in the shoes of the radiologists who have participated in the Seeing in Art and Medical Imaging program, which is offered by the Harvard Art Museums in partnership with Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. The program promotes empathy, mindfulness, and tolerance for ambiguity in the medical community through conversations about works of art, focused on themes such as care, objectivity, and power. The stops on the tour are Shutter (2006), a glazed stoneware sculpture by Rosemarie Trockel, and an Attic grave stele, Woman dying in...

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    2023 Oct 07

    Spotlight Tour: Deconstructing Disorientation, with Emily Feng '25

    2:00pm to 2:50pm

    Location: 

    Harvard Art Museums, 32 Quincy St., Cambridge

    On this tour, Emily Feng ’25 will explore how certain works of art provoke a sense of disorientation. A student of philosophy and economics, Feng will look closely at three works: Saxon Motif (1964), an oil painting made in West Germany by Georg Baselitz; Zhan Wang’s Sculpture in the Form of a Nine-Hole Scholar’s Rock, made in China in 2001; and The End of the World (1936), a painting by David Alfaro Siqueiros, which he produced in New York City.

    No registration required.

    ...

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