Enfilade

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Francisco Muntaner, The Spinners, detail, 1796, engraving
(Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett / Dietmar Katz)

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From the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin:

Get to Work! The Work and Toil of Women

An die Arbeit! Vom Schaffen und Schuften der Frauen

Kupferstichkabinett, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin 18 February — 18 May 2025

Curated by Dagmar Korbacher, Mailena Mallach, and Christien Melzer

Women’s contributions to society are often unseen and seldom considered in art. Many women’s names and their stories have long since been forgotten. Using French, German, Italian, Spanish and Dutch works on paper, this exhibition looks behind the allegorical scenes to shed light on women’s work in early modern Europe.

Louise Madeleine Cochin, after Charles-Nicolas Cochin the Younger, Le Chanteur de Cantiques, 1742, engraving and etching, 38 × 28 cm (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett / Dietmar Katz).

This small thematic exhibition presents 25 French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Dutch prints from the 16th to 18th centuries preserved in the Kupferstichkabinett’s (Museum of Prints and Drawings) rich holdings. Works have been selected that show women in everyday activities, working as peasants, farmhands, teachers, maids, midwives and courtesans. One focus provide insight into the professions practised by women, including attending to births as midwives; another shows those areas of society where men and women went about their daily tasks side by side (as equals?). Beneath the allegorical layers of meaning, the viewer often discovers self-confident women going about their lives, yet the hardship of everyday travail is evident. To this day, so-called care work for children and the elderly receives little recognition; efforts are being made to reconcile work and family life and to achieve equality between women and men, including in financial matters, but these goals have yet to be fully attained. At the same time, it becomes clear that many of the depictions displayed were created by men—Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach, and Rembrandt—to name just a few. Their (male) view of women characterised societal perspectives for centuries. Also represented, however, are two women artists, Louise Magdeleine Horthemels (1686–1767) and Marguerite Ponce (1745–1800), who earned their livings creating art.

An die Arbeit! Vom Schaffen und Schuften der Frauen is the Kupferstichkabinett’s contribution to Women’s Month in March, as well as to Equal Pay Day (7 March) and Labour Day (1 May in Europe). The exhibition is curated by Dagmar Korbacher, director; Mailena Mallach, curator of German art before 1800; and Christien Melzer, curator of Dutch and English art before 1800, Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin.

Opening in May at Historic Deerfield:

Body by Design: Fashionable Silhouettes from the Ideal to the Real

Historic Deerfield, Deerfield, Massachusetts, 3 May 2025 — 22 February 2026

Gown or robe à la française, made in France or Amsterdam, ca. 1765; blue and white brocade weave silk (paduasoy?, bleached plain weave linen lining, and silk knotted fringe (Historic Deerfield, F.355).

This exhibition explores the enduring interest in clothing our bodies to achieve fashionable shapes. It will feature twenty-five ensembles from the 18th to 21st centuries drawn predominantly from Historic Deerfield’s renowned clothing collection. Displayed along with the historical garments will be the understructures—stays, corsets, hoops skirts, and bustles—that helped shape, exaggerate, or reduce bodies to fit fashionable ideals. The show follows a loose chronological organization starting with two garments from the 1760s: a woman’s formal dress with exaggerated wide skirt supported by hooped petticoats and a man’s pink and gold brocaded suit. Fashions from the 19th century highlight huge sleeves, corseted torsos, and skirts that were supported by crinolines and bustles. Fashion plates from the museum’s collection will help contextualize styles within their time while select modern fashions, juxtaposed with historical garments, offer interesting connections between the past and today.

Opening next month at the Yale University Art Gallery:

Romney: Brilliant Contrasts in Georgian England

Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, 17 March — 14 September 2025

Organized by Brooke Krancer with the assistance of Martina Droth and Laurence Kanter

George Romney, A Conversation (or The Artist’s Brothers Peter and James Romney), 1766, oil on canvas (New Haven: Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection).

Romney: Brilliant Contrasts in Georgian England, co-organized by the Yale University Art Gallery and the Yale Center for British Art to celebrate the YCBA’s reopening, features the work of the British portrait painter George Romney (1734–1802). Remembered today for his fashionable likenesses of wealthy patrons, Romney was rivaled in late eighteenth-century London only by the now better known artists Thomas Gainsborough and Sir Joshua Reynolds. His aspirations to be a history painter were never realized, but his many drawings serve as a testament to those greater ambitions. These swiftly executed sketches reveal a mastery of form, line, and light, while his proficiency as a musician and early experience building musical instruments distinguish him among his polymath contemporaries. To fully explore the era’s subjects and sensibilities, paintings and drawings by Romney from both museums are shown alongside selections from the Morris Steinert Collection of Musical Instruments. Unveiling the contrasts in his artistic practice, the exhibition presents a forceful vision—one that has resonated with admirers through the centuries, from William Blake in Romney’s own time to the portraitist Kehinde Wiley today.

This exhibition is made possible by the Wolfe Family Exhibition and Publication Fund and is organized by Brooke Krancer, Senior Curatorial Assistant, Yale Center for British Art, with the assistance of Martina Droth, Paul Mellon Director, Yale Center for British Art, and Laurence Kanter, Chief Curator and the Lionel Goldfrank III Curator of European Art.

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Installation of the exhibition Sir William and Lady Hamilton at the Gallerie d’Italia, Naples, with a view of Joshua Reynolds’s 1777 Portrait of Sir William Hamilton (London: NPG) and George Romney’s 1782 Portrait of Lady Hamilton as Circe (Waddesdon Manor). Photo by Roberto Della Noce.

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Closing soon at the Gallerie d’Italia in Naples:

Sir William and Lady Hamilton

Gallerie d’Italia, Naples, 25 October 2024 — 2 March 2025

In the wake of the important studies by Carlo Knight (who recently passed away) and the great exhibition at the British Museum in 1996, the Gallerie d’Italia–Napoli dedicates its 2024 autumn exhibition to William Hamilton, the British royal ambassador at the court of Ferdinand IV of Bourbon and his wife Maria Carolina of Hapsburg. Diplomat, antiquarian and volcanologist, Hamilton, with his multifaceted personality, found fertile ground in the ‘Enlightened’ Naples of the second half of the 18th century to affirm and develop his great passions: antiquity and science.

Jakob Philipp Hackert, View of the English Garden at Caserta, 1793, oil on canvas, 93 × 130 cm (Madrid: Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza).

The exhibition highlights Hamilton’s great interest in volcanology, landscape painting, music, and collecting, as well as the role he played in Neapolitan society of the time, amplified by the sometimes legendary figure of Lady Emma Hamilton. In reconsidering and promoting the extraordinary human, political, and intellectual story of a man who was undoubtedly one of the greatest interpreters of his time, leaving a profound mark on the city, the exhibition also traces the fruitful cultural and artistic exchanges that took place between Italy and the United Kingdom at a key moment in European history.

By virtue of its theme, the exhibition has the support of the Italian Embassy in the United Kingdom as well as the support of the British Embassy in Rome and boasts the presence on the scientific committee of Carlo Knight and Kim Sloan, curators of the important exhibition Vases and Volcanoes dedicated to Hamilton in 1996 by the British Museum, and Aidan Weston-Lewis, Chief Curator of European Art at the National Galleries of Scotland.

William Hamilton—cadet son of Lord Archibald Hamilton, the ‘milk brother’ of King George III of England, possessed of a solid cultural education and a rich network of social relations—moved to Naples as British ambassador to the Kingdom of Naples in 1764, together with his first wife Catherine Barlow. In the Bourbon capital, where he stayed until 1798—when the French troops arrived—he was able to cultivate his greatest passions: Greco-Roman antiquities, of which he became one of the greatest collectors of all time, the scientific study of the eruptions of Vesuvius, collecting ancient and contemporary paintings, the sea, and hunting. His residences crammed with works of art and full of charm, Villa Emma in Posillipo, Villa Angelica near Torre del Greco, and especially Palazzo Sessa in Pizzofalcone with its famous view of the gulf, were the theatres of a refined and cosmopolitan worldliness for over thirty years. His extraordinary publishing ventures, his relationships with Ferdinand IV and Maria Carolina—cultivated also thanks to his second wife Emma, the legend of whom has been nurtured in modern times by literature and film—and with great international travellers, such as Goethe, Mozart, William Beckford, and the Russian Tsar Paul I, made him one of the most influential figures in 18th-century European culture, as recognised by prestigious institutions such as the Royal Academy and the Royal Society of London.

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Attributed to an unknown French prisoner in Dartmoor Prison, Napoleonic War Model (Unidentified British Frigate), ca. 1790–1820, bone with a wooden stand covered in paper, 16 × 12 × 3 inches (Philadelphia: Independence Seaport Museum, Gift of Elizabeth Blaisdell, 1969.091).

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From the press release (3 February 2025) . . .

Small but Mighty! Models, Toys, and Miniature Ships
Independence Seaport Museum, Philadelphia, opening 20 March 2025

For centuries, people of all ages have been intrigued by model ships. Made for myriad reasons ranging from pure enjoyment to promotional tools, most are unique objects made by hand. Opening on 20 March 2025, a new permanent exhibition at the Independence Seaport Museum (ISM) will display nearly 50 rarely seen models dating from the early 19th century to the later 20th century, along with related paintings and prints. Primarily made of wood, the models were also fashioned out of paper, bone, and metal. Among the examples to be displayed are extraordinarily detailed and realistic models, such as the Heavy Cruiser USS Indianapolis, as well as highly stylized toy models intended for adults and children.

“Guests to the ISM over the years have remarked at the amazing range of ship models, toys, and pond models in our permanent collection,” said Peter Seibert, museum president and CEO. “This new exhibition has given us the opportunity to not only exhibit some of the public’s favorite examples along with many that have rarely ever been shown before. Young and old alike will love exploring these masterpieces of miniature craftsmanship.”

Over the centuries, ships models were used for various purposes. Some were design sources, known as half hulls, used in building larger vessels, while others were used for sport, such as pond models that were raced. Model ships were made as toys for children, and highly crafted, expensive models were intended as toys for adults. Other models were made to commemorate new vessels and were presented to shipbuilders or owners; some that were made by prisoners were used to exchange for food. Model ships were also used as tokens of remembrance either made by those who were on particular boats or those who were simply avid towards certain boats. Most of the models in the Independence Seaport Museum’s collection are ‘scratch built’, meaning that the craftsmen had to shape each piece from raw or lightly prepared materials rather than using premade parts. This method can be complex: metal casting is often used to produce the funnels, propellers, and other elements of a highly detailed model.

Among the most noteworthy ship models to be on view is the Heavy Cruiser USS Indianapolis. The legendary ship—launched on 7 November 1931 at the New York Shipbuilding Company in Camden, New Jersey to deliver the bomb to end World War II—was sunk by Japanese submarine 1-58 on 30 July 1945, after being hit by two torpedoes. Within just twelve minutes, the ship sank and the majority of the crew was launched into the water, while the remaining 300 or so crew members were left onboard. Three days later, a random sighting by a pilot led to the rescue of some of the sailors. (Today, the USS Indianapolis is most famous because its story was recounted in a scene in the movie Jaws.) This model of the Indianapolis, built in 1934–38 by Walter H. Gerber, a German mechanical engineer who originally worked at Cramp’s Shipyard in New York and then later transferred to Cramp’s Shipyard in Philadelphia, is massive in size: it measures 12 feet long by 17 inches wide. It was originally constructed as a radio-controlled, in-water model that had the capability to power its inside mechanics as well. The maker also has an interesting story: Gerber came under scrutiny from the United States government during World War II because he was fixated on the accuracy of the model and came from an enemy country. Afraid that information about the United States Navy would fall into the wrong hands, his actions were monitored and his home was raided, looking for cameras and other equipment supposedly to have been reported and/or voluntarily turned over to the government. Nothing of significance was found.

Another exquisite model of early shipbuilding is the Napoleonic War Model. Made entirely of bone by French prisoners in the British Dartmoor Prison, it was likely traded for food (prisoners were held on British prison ships during the Napoleonic wars; other similar models may have been made by American prisoners during the war of 1812). This model depicts an unidentified British frigate with 50 guns and has a decorative paper-covered wooden stand dating from about 1790 to 1820. With no provenance, it is assumed to be French and made for the British. The model, considered a folk-art masterpiece, was presented to David Bruce, Sr. by Commodore Charles Stewart, United States Navy, at Bordentown, New Jersey, in about 1820. Stewart was a Philadelphian who served in the navy for 63 years, playing key roles in the Quasi-War, Barbary Wars, and the War of 1812.

On 10 August 1893, the Steamer Priscilla, made by the Delaware River Iron Shipbuilding and Engine Works Company (John Roach & Sons) in Chester, Pennsylvania, for the Old Colony Steamboat Company, launched. Three years later, she was recreated as a child’s toy by R. Bliss Manufacturing Company in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, known for making inexpensive but realistic toys. One of these large toy ships made of chromolithographed paper attached to a wooden frame is equipped with wheels for motion, is a highlight of Small but Mighty! Measuring 37 inches long by 20 inches high and 5 inches wide, it is in pristine condition and illustrates the color and beauty of late 19th-century ships. This faithfully executed toy offered children a duplicate of the type of vessels actively used on America’s waterways. Toys such as these were sailed on the floors of large Victorian homes and enjoyed by children and, likely, adults as well.

The racing of small model yachts began in England in the 1870s, spread across the European continent, and eventually came to the United States. (New York’s Central Park Lake was built expressly for people to use in sailing pond models.) Organizations such as the Model Yacht Association determined rules and umpired regattas of two types: open water sailing and pond sailing. By 1950, five classes of model yachts were used, including the Marblehead or ‘M’ Class (also known as the 50/800 Class). Their small, manageable size made this sport appealing to those who could not handle a full-scale boat or those with limited financial resources. One such example of an ‘M’ Class model made in 1949, the Pond Yacht Almary II, is featured in the exhibition. It was made by Albert Link (born in Fishtown, Pennsylvania, 1909–1993) and is considered to be one of the biggest and best of its kind. Link worked as a machinist for Smith, Kline, and Beecham in Philadelphia. Link built approximately 15 model sailboats in his lifetime (the Almary II was his eighth) and raced them at Gustine Lake in Fairmont Park, Concourse Hunting Park, League Island Swimming Pool in Philadelphia as well as on Cooper River in Camden, New Jersey, and Long Island, New York. In 1950, he was a national prize winner at the New York Yacht Club and again in 1954 at Cooper River. He stopped racing that same year.

For children of all ages who are fascinated with model ships, Small but Mighty! Models, Toys, and Miniature Ships will delight and inform.