Exhibition | Wonders of Creation: Art and Science in the Islamic World
Star map depicting the Northern and Southern celestial hemispheres (with constellations inscribed in Devanagari), India, Jaipur, ca. 1780, ink, opaque watercolor, and gold on paper (Chicago: Pritzker Collection; photo by Michael Tropea).
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From the press release (11 July) for the exhibition:
Wonders of Creation: Art, Science, and Innovation in the Islamic World
The San Diego Museum of Art, 7 September 2024 — 5 January 2025
McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, 2025
Curated by Ladan Akbarnia
The San Diego Museum of Art (SDMA) invites visitors to explore sources of wonder in the exhibition, Wonders of Creation: Art, Science, and Innovation in the Islamic World. The exhibition explores intersections of science and craft in Islamic material culture and contemporary art through the framework of a 13th-century text by Zakariyya ibn Muhammad al-Qazwini describing the wonders of the universe.
This trailblazing exhibition, organized by Ladan Akbarnia, Curator of South Asian and Islamic Art at The San Diego Museum of Art, showcases over 200 extraordinary works of art and objects from the eighth century to today. Using wonder as the vehicle to introduce and explore Islamic culture, Wonders of Creation illuminates the global impact of science and artistic production from the Islamic world while introducing new audiences to its diverse geographies and multifaceted visual cultures. With treasures including lavishly illuminated and illustrated manuscripts, fine textiles, luster-painted glass and ceramic wares, astrolabes and star maps, talismans, inscribed precious stones, and architectural marvels, visitors will gain a deeper appreciation of ingenuity and craftsmanship spanning 13 centuries across the Islamic world.
Nastulus, Astrolabe, 101 AH (ca. 720), 18 × 22 cm (Kuwait: al-Sabah Collection). The note at the Google Arts & Culture page describes this as “the earliest dated Islamic astrolabe.”
The exhibition presents works from more than 30 lenders, including major loans from The al-Sabah Collection, Dar Al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, Kuwait; and the Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia (IAMM). Works from the IAMM are on loan to the US for the first time. In addition to selections from these prestigious collections, visitors will also see contemporary commissions specifically for the exhibition by artists Ala Ebtekar and Hayv Kahraman, along with works by other prominent contemporary artists. The Museum has also commissioned Mamluk joinery samples made by master craftsman Hassan Abou Zeid of the Egyptian Heritage Rescue Foundation to introduce a hands-on opportunity for guests and commissioned two contemporary replicas of a 17th-century Persian astrolabe by Taha Yasin Arslan to further evoke a sense of awe throughout the exhibition. Wonders of Creation is designed to invite visitors to explore the marvels of the heavens and the earth and admire the crafts and customs of humanity.
“We are thrilled to present this groundbreaking exhibition to our visitors with support from the Getty through its PST Art: Art & Science Collide initiative,” says Roxana Velásquez, Maruja Baldwin Executive Director and CEO at The San Diego Museum of Art. “This exhibition celebrates the rich cultural heritage and enduring legacy of Islamic civilization, inviting audiences of all backgrounds to discover and appreciate its profound and diverse contributions.”
Qazwini’s text, The Wonders of Creation and the Rarities of Existence, is a revolutionary cosmography that meticulously details the universe, blending scientific knowledge with fantastical anecdotes, portraying all phenomena as signs of divine creation. The author, an Islamic judge and professor, emphasized wonder as a path to knowledge, urging readers to contemplate natural marvels to deepen their understanding of God and the cosmos. Today, his work remains influential, offering insights into Islamic culture and inspiring curiosity about natural phenomena. The exhibition invites visitors to explore some of the world’s wonders in the spirit of Qazwini’s call to wonder.
Wonders of Creation is part of Getty PST Art, an arts initiative that brings together more than 70 exhibitions from organizations across the Southern California region, all exploring intersections of art and science. Funding for this exhibition is made possible with support from Getty through its PST ART: Art & Science Collide initiative and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Wonders of Creation is also supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts, and additional support is provided by Bank of America, Lani and Joe Curtis, Tatiana and Robert Dotson, Diana and Fred Elghanayan, Drs. Nasrin Owsia and Behrooz Akbarnia, The Nissan Foundation, and A.O. Reed. Institutional support is provided by the City of San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture and the members of The San Diego Museum of Art.
Wonders of Creation will be on view at The San Diego Museum of Art from 7 September 2024 until 5 January 2025. It will then travel to the McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College. The exhibition is complemented by a full-color catalogue with original research and contributions from leading international scholars, a scholarly symposium, artists in conversation, family-oriented art-making workshops, performances, and other programming for the community.
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Also worth noting is this recent study of al-Qazvini’s The Wonders of Creation from Edinburgh UP:
Stefano Carboni, The Wonders of Creation and the Singularities of Painting: A Study of the Ilkhanid London Qazvīnī (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020), 456 pages, ISBN: 978-1474461399, $65.
A beautifully illustrated study of the so-called London Qazvini, an early fourteenth-century illustrated Arabic copy of al-Qazvini’s The Wonders of Creation and the Oddities of Existing Things. One of a handful of extant illustrated codices produced under the Mongols of Iran, this unique manuscript gathers earlier Mesopotamian painting traditions, North Jaziran-Seljuq elements, Anatolian inspiration, the latest changes brought about after the advent of Mongols and a large number of illustrations of extraordinary subjects which escape proper classification. In this lavishly illustrated volume Stefano Carboni offers a stylistic analysis and discussion of the manuscript’s miniatures, a presentation and description of the 368 extant paintings that illustrate the codex, and a partial critical translation of the related Arabic text. This is the first time that sections throughout the whole text are available in English.
Stefano Carboni is the director and CEO of the Art Gallery of Western Australia and adjunct professor at the University of Western Australia. He is author and editor of several books including Glass from Islamic Lands: The Al-Sabah Collection (2001) and Venice and the Islamic World 828–1797 (2007).
Exhibition | Magnified Wonders: An 18th-Century Microscope
From the press release (17 July) for the exhibition:
Magnified Wonders: An 18th-Century Microscope
J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 10 September 2024 — 2 February 2025
Curated by Miriam Schefzyk and Arlen Heginbotham
Compound Microscope with a Micrometric Stage, early 1750s, gilt bronze, iron, enamel, shagreen (sharkskin), and glass (Getty Museum, 86.DH.694.1).
The J. Paul Getty Museum presents Magnified Wonders: An 18th-Century Microscope, an exhibition showcasing a French microscope from Getty’s collection as both a scientific instrument and Rococo work of art during the Age of Enlightenment. On view at the Getty Center from 10 September 2024 until 2 February 2025, the exhibition highlights this object’s cultural and historical context and reveals its technical complexity. It is one of only ten existing microscopes of this type in the world, and Getty is the only museum in the United States with one in its collection.
Made in Paris around 1751, the microscope features advanced micrometers for precision measurement, and specialized accessories for viewing many types of specimens. It is nearly identical to the one used by the French king Louis XV. Aristocrats and amateur scientists used this microscope to explore the mysteries of the natural world, illustrating the social élite’s interest in scientific inquiry.
“It is remarkable that this microscope is still in perfect working order,” says Arlen Heginbotham, conservator of decorative arts conservation at the Getty Museum. “The quality of the optics is truly impressive, and the gears and dials still function smoothly and precisely.”
The Getty microscope will be on display alongside its lavish leather case containing lenses, tools, and specimen slides of natural curiosities. The exhibition highlights the scientific and social context of this instrument through a selection of illustrated scientific publications from the period, drawn from the collections of the Getty Research Institute. Robert Hooke’s famous Micrographia will be on view, a publication that features illustrations of specimens that he explored with the compound microscope. Video and digital presentations will demonstrate the fully functional microscope’s uses and capabilities and allow visitors to view period illustrations of microscopic specimens.
“It is incredible to think about how this microscope opened up a whole new cosmos heretofore invisible to the naked eye,” says Miriam Schefzyk, associate curator of sculpture and decorative arts at the Getty Museum.
While the microscope is a complex scientific instrument, it is also a unique work of art in the Rococo style. A dominant style in France from the 1730s through the 1750s, it was applied to all artworks, including decorative arts, gardens, interiors, and even scientific instruments. Inspired by nature, its major characteristics are C and S curves, asymmetrical composition, and dynamic movement. The exhibition will also feature several prints with designs that include these distinct Rococo motifs, as well as a wall clock made by Jacques Caffieri, highlighting the similarity of its elaborate design in gilt bronze.
Magnified Wonders: An 18th-Century Microscope is co-curated by Miriam Schefzyk, associate curator of sculpture and decorative arts at the Getty Museum, and Arlen Heginbotham, conservator of decorative arts conservation at the Getty Museum.
This exhibition is part of PST ART, a Getty initiative presenting over 70 exhibitions at institutions across Southern California tied to the theme Art & Science Collide.
Exhibition | Paper and Light
Opening in October at The Getty:
Paper and Light
J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 15 October 2024 — 19 January 2025
Artists have for centuries explored the interaction of paper and light. This exhibition of drawings charts some of the innovative ways in which the two media were creatively used together. Works include the Museum’s extraordinary 12-foot-long transparency by Carmontelle—essentially an 18th-century motion picture—which will be shown lit from behind as originally intended. Drawings by more contemporary artists including Vija Celmins will join sheets by Tiepolo, Delacroix, Seurat, and Manet to portray the themes of translucency and the representation of light.
Julian Brooks and Michelle Sullivan, Paper and Light: Luminous Drawings (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2024), 112 pages, ISBN 978-1606069301, $25.
The treatment of light and shadow is one of the building blocks of drawing. From techniques such as highlights and reserves, to material selection and the creation of translucent tracing paper, to the use of light as a medium for viewing artworks, artists for hundreds of years have found innovative and dazzling ways to create light on a sheet of paper. This publication examines the central relationship between paper and light in the world of drawings in western European art from the Renaissance to the twentieth century. Focusing on drawings from the collection of the J. Paul Getty Museum, as well as works from the British Museum, Musée du Louvre, and others, and featuring masterful works by such artists as Parmigianino, Leonardo da Vinci, Nicolas Poussin, Odilon Redon, Edgar Degas, and Georges Seurat, Paper and Light will entice readers to look longer and more closely at drawings, deriving an even deeper appreciation for the skill and labor that went into them.
Julian Brooks is senior curator and head of the Department of Drawings at the J. Paul Getty Museum. Michelle Sullivan is associate conservator of drawings at the J. Paul Getty Museum.
Exhibition | The Paradox of Pearls
Opening next month at The Walpole Library:
The Paradox of Pearls: Accessorizing Identities in the Eighteenth Century
The Lewis Walpole Library, Farmington, CT, 27 September 2024 — 31 January 2025
Curated by Laura Engel
William Hoare, Portrait of Maria Walpole, ca. 1742, pastel on paper (The Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University, LWL Ptg. 152).
Pearls figure prominently in pictures of celebrated and imagined figures across the eighteenth century. Adorning royalty, celebrities, servants, and in fashion plates, the mysterious, opaque, and gleaming white accessory aligns with the mutable, seductive, and threatening emergence of new forms of identity. Worn as jewelry, as embellishments to the body and dress, or embedded in the settings of precious objects—pearls accessorize, highlight, colonize, and perform. As one of the most sought-after commodities of the early modern colonial enterprise, a precious jewel tied to bondage and violence, pearls have a baroque and complex history. Drawing from materials in the Lewis Walpole Library this exhibition will explore the ‘paradox of pearls’ by considering how the varied and often contradictory meanings of this jewel appear in period images and the ways in which practices from the past connect us to the powerful presence of pearls today. The exhibition is curated by Professor Laura Engel of Duquesne University.
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Curator Talk with Laura Engel
The Lewis Walpole Library, 16 November 2024, 2pm
From Queen Elizabeth I to Harry Styles, the legacy of pearls is a story about self-fashioning. Pearls feature prominently in many pictures of celebrated figures from the past. Worn as jewelry—as embellishments of the body and apparel, or embedded in the settings of precious objects—pearls illuminate ideas about beauty, power, and style. Drawing upon materials in the Lewis Walpole Library, this talk considers how the varied and often contradictory meanings of this jewel were represented in period images and the ways in which practices from the past connect us to the enduring presence of pearls today. Space is limited, and advance registration through the Farmington Libraries site is required. Registration link forthcoming.
Exhibition | Olympus on the Lake: Canova, Thorvaldsen, Hayez
Jean-Baptiste Joseph Wicar, Virgil Reading the Sixth Canto of the Aeneid, 1818–21, oil on canvas
(Tremezzo: Museo di Villa Carlotta)
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Now on view at Villa Carlotta (with an English description available here) . . .
Olympus on the Lake: Canova, Thorvaldsen, Hayez, and the Treasures of the Sommariva Collection
Villa Carlotta, Tremezzo (on Lake Como), 22 June – 30 September 2024
Abile politico e potente braccio destro di Napoleone a Milano, Giovanni Battista Sommariva (1762–1826) è stato uno dei maggiori e più celebri collezionisti tra l’Impero e la Restaurazione. Approfittando di quei tempi di rapidi e radicali cambiamenti, nel 1802—quando si interruppe la sua breve ma fulminante carriera—era ormai riuscito a costruirsi una immensa fortuna.
La sua leggendaria raccolta era una delle più importanti dell’epoca, insieme a quelle dei familiari di Napoleone, in particolare dell’imperatrice Josephine. Divisa tra il suo palazzo a Parigi, in uno dei quartieri più alla moda della città, e la villa di Tremezzo sul Lago di Como (oggi Villa Carlotta), vantava dipinti antichi e capolavori dei maggiori artisti dell’epoca—David, Prud’hon, Girodet, Wicar, Appiani, Bossi, Hayez—oltre a una infinità di preziosi oggetti d’arte. Soprattutto per la presenza a Villa Sommariva delle opere di Canova e degli splendidi marmi di Thorvaldsen, accorrevano viaggiatori da tutto il mondo, tra cui personaggi illustri come Stendhal, Lady Morgan, Flaubert. Attraverso una selezione delle opere più famose di quella straordinaria collezione—sculture, dipinti, stampe, gioielli e miniature—Villa Carlotta celebra un magnifico protagonista della propria storia e un grande mecenate di statura europea.
Per tutta la durata della mostra L’Olimpo sul lago, è possibile visitare presso il Museo del Paesaggio del Lago di Como (Tremezzina) l’esposizione Paesaggio sublime: Il Lago di Como all’epoca di Giovanni Battista Sommariva (1801–1826) che esporrà incisioni, tempere e acquerelli della prima a metà del XIX secolo con il proposito di evocare l’aspetto del lago e dei suoi borghi al tempo di Giovanni Battista Sommariva.
Fernando Mazzocca, Maria Angela Previtera, and Elena Lissoni, eds., L’Olimpo sul lago: Canova, Thorvaldsen, Hayez e i tesori della Collezione Sommariva (Milan: Silvana Editoriale, 2024), 352 pages, ISBN 978-8836658336, €35.
Exhibition | Belle da Costa Greene: A Librarian’s Legacy
Opening in October at The Morgan:
Belle da Costa Greene: A Librarian’s Legacy
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, 25 October 2024 — 4 May 2025
Organized by Philip Palmer and Erica Ciallela
The incredible story of the first director of the Morgan Library: a visionary Black woman who walked confidently in an early 20th-century man’s world of wealth and privilege
To mark the 2024 centenary of its life as a public institution, the Morgan Library & Museum will present a major exhibition devoted to the life and career of its inaugural director, Belle da Costa Greene (1879–1950). Widely recognized as an authority on illuminated manuscripts and deeply respected as a cultural heritage executive, Greene was one of the most prominent librarians in American history.
She was the daughter of Genevieve Ida Fleet Greener (1849–1941) and Richard T. Greener (1844–1922), the first Black graduate of Harvard College, and was at birth known by a different name: Belle Marion Greener. After her parents separated in the 1890s, her mother changed the family surname to Greene, Belle and her brother adopted variations of the middle name da Costa, and the family began to pass as White in a racist and segregated America.
Greene is well known for the instrumental role she played in building the exceptional collection of rare books and manuscripts formed by American financier J. Pierpont Morgan, who hired her as his personal librarian in 1905. After Morgan’s death in 1913, Greene continued as the librarian of his son and heir, J.P. Morgan Jr., who would transform his father’s Library into a public institution in 1924. But her career as director of what was then known as the Pierpont Morgan Library―a leadership role she held for twenty-four years―is less well understood, as are aspects of her education, private collecting, and dense social and professional networks.
The exhibition will trace Greene’s storied life, from her roots in a predominantly Black community in Washington, D.C., to her distinguished career at the helm of one of the world’s great research libraries. Through extraordinary objects―from medieval manuscripts and rare printed books to archival records and portraits―the exhibition will demonstrate the confidence and savvy Greene brought to her roles as librarian, scholar, curator, and cultural executive, and honor her enduring legacy.
This exhibition is organized by Philip Palmer, Robert H. Taylor Curator and Department Head of Literary and Historical Manuscripts, and Erica Ciallela, Exhibition Project Curator.
Erica Ciallela and Philip Palmer, eds., Belle da Costa Greene: A Librarian’s Legacy (New York: DelMonico Books, 2024), 304 pages, ISBN: 978-1636811352, $50. With a foreword by Colin Bailey, an afterword by Tamar Evangelestia-Dougherty, and contributions by Araceli Bremauntz-Enriquez, Julia Charles-Linen, Erica Ciallela, Rhonda Evans, Anne-Marie Eze, Daria Rose Foner, Jiemi Gao, Juliana Amorim Goskes, Gail Levin, Philip Palmer, Deborah Parker, and Deborah Willis.
The Magazine of the Decorative Arts Trust, Summer 2024
The Decorative Arts Trust has shared select articles from the summer issue of their member magazine as online articles for all to enjoy. The following articles are related to the 18th century:
The Magazine of the Decorative Arts Trust, Summer 2024
• “A Primer on Portugal” by Matthew A. Thurlow Link»
• “Saltram’s Saloon: Adam, Chippendale, and Reynolds in England’s West Country” by Catherine Carlisle Link»
• “Understanding Craft: A New Digital Tool Debuts” by Emily Zaiden Link»
• “Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800: Highlights from LACMA’s Collection” by the Saint Louis Art Museum Link»
• “Painted Walls: New Virtual Museum Offers an Immersive Experience” by by Margaret Gaertner and Kathleen Criscitiello Link»
• “Seafaring Portraits in Bermuda and the Atlantic Basin” by Damiët Schneeweisz Link»
• “Summer Reading Recommendation: Ceramic Art” by Jessie Dean Link»
The printed Magazine of the Decorative Arts Trust is mailed to Trust members twice per year. Memberships start at $50, with $25 memberships for students.
Pictured: The magazine cover features a detail of wall tile from the stair hall of the Palácio Azurara in Lisbon, home of the Fundação Ricardo do Espírito Santo Silva’s decorative arts museum. Bartholomeu Antunes, Tile with the Figure of a Praetorian Guard, 1730–40, Lisbon. Earthenware tile with blue and yellow decoration.
The Burlington Magazine, June 2024
Summer is for falling behind . . . and for catching up . . . The long 18th century in the June issue of The Burlington:
The Burlington Magazine 166 (June 2024)
e d i t o r i a l
• “La Serenissima,” p, 543.
Henry James famously wrote in his Italian Hours (1909) that there is nothing more to be said about Venice. As so much ink has been spilt over its charms you can see his point. However, James then proceeded to rhapsodise at length about its beauty; and it is imperative that we, similarly, keep talking and writing and championing it, not least because all that it represents seems to be more precious and precarious than ever.
a r t i c l e s
• Ittai Gradel, “Nothing To Do with Menander: A Rediscovered Roman Cameo from the Caylus Collection,” pp. 546–53.
A Roman cameo published in 1752, but since lost, has been rediscovered. It shows actors rehearsing The Pimp by Posidippus, who portrait is included on the cameo. All other identifiable scenes of comedies in Roman art depict plays by Menander, the most popular Greek comic poet on the Roman stage.
• Gauvin Alexander Bailey, “The Cathedral of Notre-Dame-de-la-Conception, Pondicherry,” pp. 580–95.
When the cathedral at Pondicherry, the most ambitious in French India, was begun in 1771, its anonymous designer was obliged to make allowance for separation of the castes, despite a papal edict that they must attend public worship together. The cathedral was completed with the construction of its west facade in 1788–91; its design was based on seventeenth-century Parisian models and is here attributed to the engineer-architect François-Anne-Maire Rapine de Saxy.
• Ricarda Brosch, “The Art of Qing Imperial Afterlife: The Pictures of Ancient Playthings (Guwantu 古玩圖) Revisited,” pp. 596–611.
Two magnificent eighteenth-century handscrolls depict myriad precious objects made of jade, bronze, porcelain, glass, and bamboo. A novel interpretation of their function suggests that the illustrations were originally for wall decorations and remounted as scrolls for the Yongzheng Emperor’s tomb. The paintings’ remediation and repurposing offer a compelling example of the art of Qing imperial afterlife.
r e v i e w s
• Johnny Yarker, Review of the exhibition Angelica Kauffman (London: Royal Academy of Arts, 2024), pp. 620–23.
• William Barcham, Review of Martin Gayford, Venice: City of Pictures (Thames & Hudson, 2023), p. 653.
• Lianming Wang, Review of Henriette Lavaulx-Vrécourt and Niklas Leverenz, Berliner Schlachtenkupfer: 34 Druckplatten der Kaiser von China / Berlin Battle Engravings: 34 Copperplates for the Emperors of China (Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2021), pp. 654–55.
• Amina Wright, Review of Frédéric Ogée, Thomas Lawrence: Le génie du portrait anglais (Cohen & Cohen, 2022), pp. 655–56.
• Barry Bergdoll, Review of Didem Ekici, Patricia Blessing, Basile Baudez, eds., Textile in Architecture: From the Middle Ages to Modernism (Routledge, 2023), pp. 662–63.
Exhibition | Living with Sculpture: Presence and Power
From the press release for the exhibition:
Living with Sculpture: Presence and Power in Europe, 1400–1750
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth, Hanover, New Hampshire, 23 March 2024 — 22 March 2025
Curated by Elizabeth Rice Mattison and Ashley Offill
The Hood Museum of Art presents Living with Sculpture: Presence and Power in Europe, 1400–1750, on view from 23 March 2024 until 22 March 2025. Drawing on the wealth of the Hood Museum’s permanent collection, the exhibition contributes to the field’s understanding of the role of sculpture in everyday life, historically and today. Whether given as tokens of affection, cast to memorialize important events, designed to promote faith, or used to write a letter, these sculptures engaged their spectators in dialogues of devotion, authority, and intimacy.
Living with Sculpture is curated by two scholars at the Hood Museum of Art: Elizabeth Rice Mattison, Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Academic Programming and Curator of European Art, and Ashley B. Offill, Curator of Collections. It includes 164 objects in two galleries and is accompanied by a major publication of the same title.
Sculpture enlivened private and public spaces in medieval and Renaissance Europe, contributing to presentations of identity, practices of devotion, and promotions of nationhood. Featuring objects made across the continent, this exhibition examines the significance of sculpture between 1400 and 1750, an era of profound cultural and social change. Amid war, colonization, religious conflict, academic upheaval, and social stratification, these works of art ornamented homes, altars, libraries, and collections.
The role of sculpture as a commemorative and connective tool is newly evident in today’s debates about monuments and cultural patrimony. Sculpture manipulates notions of history, forges bonds between distant places, and promotes future actions, as this exhibition shows. Bringing this often-cerebral area of study down to earth, exhibition curators Elizabeth Rice Mattison and Ashley Offill note, “In examining a group of historic objects, this exhibition highlights the way that the material things with which we surround ourselves are critical to developing our personal identities and our relationships with one another. As curators, we lived with these objects during this project, gaining insight into the works and the people who owned them. The choice of a laurel wreath or a cross on a medal was, in many ways, just as informative back then as a social media bio is today.”
Recent examinations of sculpture suggest its singular presence and power for its makers, patrons, and audiences. The dynamism of sculpture became particularly evident in the 15th and 16th centuries with the explosion of interest in purchasing mass-produced objects such as plaquettes and small-scale bronzes. Technological innovations in making sculpture allowed artists to expand their markets and create new types of artwork.
Organized thematically, this exhibition focuses on small-scale sculptures for everyday spaces. With these works, artists could enhance their status and promote their creativity. Meanwhile, useful sculptures like locks and inkwells communicated their owners’ identities and prestige. In collecting sculptures, patrons activated their social connections. Sculpture also facilitated access to the divine, through objects that focused prayer and encouraged tactile connection with God. Similarly, sculptures forged a sense of history, recording contemporary events and promoting ideas about the past. Together, the sculptures presented here attest to how objects in bronze, wood, or stone gave meaning to people’s lives in early modern Europe.
This exhibition and its corresponding catalogue are organized by the Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth, and generously supported by the Leon C. 1927, Charles L. 1955, and Andrew J. 1984 Greenebaum Fund, and by grants from the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation and the Samuel H. Kress Foundation.
The catalogue is distributed by Penn State UP:
Elizabeth Rice Mattison and Ashley Offill, Living with Sculpture: Presence and Power in Europe, 1400–1750 (Hanover: Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth, 2024), 340 pages, ISBN: 978-0944722558, $50.
The accompanying publication includes five thematic essays, extended catalogue entries for 99 objects, and an illustrated checklist of 114 additional objects from the important collection of early modern sculpture at the Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth. The book is published by the Hood Museum of Art, distributed by The Pennsylvania State University Press, and produced by Marquand Books, Seattle.
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Exhibition Colloquium | Living with Sculpture
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth, 7 September 2024
In connection with the exhibition, this colloquium brings together scholars and curators from around the Northeast to discuss how audiences, patrons, and makers engaged with sculpture in the Middle Ages and early modern period. Ranging from twelfth-century Spain to seventeenth-century Rome, the discussion topics will offer an in-depth examination of making and living with sculpture. The day will include a tour of the exhibition led by its curators, Elizabeth Rice Mattison and Ashley Offill. Check-in opens at 9.30am, and the program will begin at 10.00. The colloquium itself is free, by registration at Eventbrite. A limited number of hotel rooms are available at the Hanover Inn under the block ‘Living with Sculpture’. Please reserve before August 7.
p r e s e n t a t i o n s
• Elizabeth Lastra (Vassar College), Threads of Power and Identity: Exploring Textile Motifs in Sculpture at the Romanesque Monastery of San Zoilo
• Kelley Helmstutler Di Dio (University of Vermont), Seeing Two Sides of the Same Coin: Leone Leoni’s Circle and their Medals in the Hood Museum
• Lara Yeager-Crasselt (Baltimore Museum of Art), François Duquesnoy’s Funerary Monument to the Painter Jacob de Hase: Untangling Flemish Expatriate Networks in Rome
• Laura Tillery (Hamilton College), The Armed Image of Olav Lorenzo Buonanno, University of Massachusetts, Boston, Living with Imaginary Sculptures
• Miya Tokumitsu (Davison Art Center, Wesleyan), Gothic to Grotesque: Sculptural Ornament in the Prints of Lucas van Leyden
• Nicola Camerlenghi (Dartmouth College), Living Sculptures in the Renaissance Streets of Rome
Exhibition | Worlds Collide: Archaeology and Global Trade
From the press release for the exhibition:
Worlds Collide: Archaeology and Global Trade in Williamsburg
DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum, Colonial Williamsburg, 7 September 2024 — 2 January 2027
Madeira Decanter, England, ca. 1750, colorless leaded glass, excavated at Wetherburn’s Tavern (Colonial Williamsburg).
We live in an international world where people, commerce, ideas, and traditions cross borders on a daily basis, and this concept is hardly new. As a new exhibition will show at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum, one of the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg, these aspects of life were just as evident in the 18th century. Worlds Collide: Archaeology and Global Trade in Williamsburg will reveal the colonial capitol of Virginia to have been a thriving, urban center coursing with people and goods from all over the world as evidenced through approximately 225 archaeological artifacts curated by Colonial Williamsburg’s renowned team of archaeologists. From Spanish coins to Chinese porcelain, punch bowls with political slogans to printer’s type and a dog’s tag, botanicals and glass, the objects vary widely and represent a mere fraction of the over 60 million objects in the collection. Through the opportunity to recover and understand these artifacts, which are the material remains of daily lives of residents from Virginia and abroad, the evidence shows the collision of worlds that defined the town.
“Written documents, works of art, and other sources of information about the past invariably carry the biases of their creators,” said Ron Hurst, the Foundation’s chief mission officer, “but archaeological deposits offer a largely unbiased view of past civilizations. This exhibition illustrates clearly that worldwide commerce is nothing new and touched most parts of the north Atlantic world in the 18th century, even in a place as small as Williamsburg, Virginia.”
Cities such as Williamsburg were hubs where the numerous customs, styles, and tastes of its inhabitants clashed, melded, and evolved through daily interactions. Eighteenth-century Williamsburg was home to people representing a broad mix of economic status, genders, and ages. In addition to Indigenous people and those of European descent, more than half of the town’s population was African or African American, the majority of which was enslaved. The objects seen in Worlds Collide reflect just as much the daily lives of these men, women and children as they do the individuals who enslaved them. To illuminate the diversity of these facets of everyday life, the exhibition is organized around five main themes: material goods, food, ideas, landscapes, and people. When visitors walk through the galleries, they may be surprised to recognize themselves in aspects of the colonial capitol.
“Archaeology provides a tangible connection to the past through the materials we find,” said Jack Gary, Colonial Williamsburg’s executive director of archaeology. “These aren’t abstract ideas but materials that we can all look at together and that can spark discussions about our shared past. Guests will likely see themselves and the modern world in many of these themes.”
Wetherburn’s Tavern in Colonial Williamsburg was especially successful in the 1750s. The exhibition will include cowrie shells and a leaded glass Madeira decanter excavated at the site.
Among the highlighted objects are cowrie shells recovered from Wetherburn’s Tavern. Cowries are the small shells of marine gastropods that make their homes in shallow reef lagoons within the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Harvested in these regions, the shells of these creatures were used as currency throughout the Indo- Pacific and portions of sub-Saharan Africa for centuries, traveling from as far east as the Maldives to the Bight of Benin in western Africa. The value of these shells as money, however, led to their exploitation in the transatlantic slave trade. Purchased and processed in the Pacific, these shells were imported to West Africa by European traders extensively as goods of exchange to fund the forced migration of millions of Africans to the Americas. While these objects played a role in this story of human bondage and suffering, they may also speak to the power of memory and the resilient identity of those who were enslaved. Often recovered from archaeological sites once occupied by enslaved men, women, and children, these shells were also used as items of adornment or keepsakes. This kind of usage may speak to individuals’ attempts to draw on transatlantic memories and traditions to reclaim their identity in the face of the dehumanizing system of enslavement in the 18th century in places such as Williamsburg.
“Whether in the 18th century or today, the objects we use in our daily lives make statements about who we are, what we value, and the connections between ourselves and others in the world. It is exciting to bring so many artifacts that represent a truly diverse set of 18th-century Williamsburg’s population into the public eye,” said Sean Devlin, senior curator of archaeological collections at Colonial Williamsburg.
Another highlighted object to be seen in the exhibition is a fragment of a Chinese export porcelain platter owned by John Murry, Earl of Dunmore, who was the last royal governor of Virginia. It is especially unique as it may have traveled the farthest among the objects included in Worlds Collide. Adorned with the armorial decoration of a Scottish noble, this object was found among the late 18th-century refuse in Williamsburg on the site of Prentis Store. Most likely its story began as part of a written order for a large dinner service of tableware, perhaps accompanied by a drawing of the decoration, issued to a European merchant by Lord Dunmore. The order would have traveled to the Chinese port of Guangzhou where workshops specialized in applying the fine overglaze decoration that was requested. The porcelain pieces themselves, however, had previously been shipped to Guangzhou from the city of Jingdezhen (located 400 miles inland), which was an early factory city that produced nearly all porcelain for both domestic and export markets. Finally translated from text to physical object, this service was packed into the hold of a returning merchant ship before being delivered to Dunmore in Scotland. It then continued its global trek when Dunmore was appointed to governing positions first in New York and then Virginia. On the eve of the Revolution in 1775, Dunmore was forced to flee Williamsburg and left most of the family’s household possessions in the Governor’s Palace. From there, portions of this dinner service, which had literally sailed across most of the globe, ended their journey dispersed about the town.
Excavation at Wetherburn’s Tavern also produced a glass decanter for Madeira wine. In the 18th century, Virginians preferred to drink European wines at home and in taverns, and wines from Spain and Portugal were more prevalent than those from France. Among the favorites of Colonials was Madeira, a sweet, fortified wine produced on the Atlantic Island of the same name that was controlled by Portugal. Most of these wines were shipped in barrels or storage jars, and often needed to be decanted into individual bottles or vessels for serving. In this instance, not only did the contents of the decanter cross the world’s oceans but so did the vessel. Made of leaded glass, the decanter almost certainly was imported to Williamsburg upon a merchant ship from Britain and was of a very fashionable type in the mid-1700s. The body is engraved with a chain on which hangs a label bearing the engraved word ‘MADEIRA’ and surrounded by appropriate decoration, such as grapes, grape leaves, tendrils, and possibly grape flowers.
A broad hoe found at Carters Grove Plantation is an example of the agricultural products that flowed back and forth from the Virginia colony and Britain. Tobacco was the first crop to overtake the countryside in the areas around Williamsburg in the late 17th and early 18th centuries, and the tendrils of this crop reached into every facet of daily life there. The tobacco hoe was a uniquely colonial tool that evolved over the 18th century as did the cultivation of the crop itself; the shape and construction of hoes changed in response to the needs of the agricultural enterprise. By early in the century, hoes were being produced in the tens of thousands in Britain for export to the colonies in North America and the Caribbean. This hoe is stamped with a repeated ‘AD’ mark that likely denoted the shop or individual who made the tool, even though their name is lost to time.
Further exemplifying how the 18th-century economy was truly global is a Tuscan oil jar found at the Anthony Hay House and Cabinet Shop site. Massive jars such as this were produced in northern Italy, particularly in the upper reaches of the Arno River Valley. The jars were brought down river and used to store and ship edible oils from ports such as Livorno. Among the largest buyers of these oils were British merchants and the
British navy. These pots traveled from Italian ports to docksides in London and around the globe in the holds of these ships, being found in such diverse settings as Jamaica, Patagonia, and coastal Australia, as well as Williamsburg.
For anyone fascinated by archaeology, globalization or material culture, Worlds Collide: Archaeology and Global Trade in Williamsburg is certain to fascinate, delight, and educate. It also will serve as an important orientation to Colonial Williamsburg’s Historic Area, as it will expand the visitor’s imagination to the daily lives of all those who lived there in the 18th century.
The exhibition is generously funded by Jacomien Mars.
Information on additional objects can be found here»
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