Pieter Broucke, Associate Curator of Ancient Art and curator of Visions of Grandeur, will offer opening remarks and an introduction to the exhibit. Afterward, enjoy hot hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar in the lobby.
Giovanni Battista Piranesi was an artist like no other. Working as an architect, printmaker, polemicist, archaeologist, interior designer, and art dealer, he created works that even today define our notions of Ancient and Modern Rome, and which helped establish a taste for Neoclassical design that spread across Europe. His powers of invention were prodigious, and his influence enormous—maddeningly so for some of his contemporaries. This lecture will survey Piranesi’s fantastic inventions, exploring the process of their creation and their lasting legacy.
John Marciari is the Director of Curatorial Affairs and the Head of the Department of Drawings and Prints at the Morgan Library & Museum, where he was responsible for the 2023 exhibition and catalogue Sublime Ideas: Drawings by Giovanni Battista Piranesi.
Physical connoisseurship of works of art informs the analysis, authentication, and conservation of art. Theresa Fairbanks Harris, Senior Works on Paper Conservator at the Yale University Art Museums, will illustrate these topics through examples focusing on the conservation of paper and the printmaking process of Giovanni Piranesi.
Associate Curator of Ancient Art Pieter Broucke will talk about the process of working with students to curate the Museum’s current exhibit, Visions of Grandeur. Afterward, stay for conversation over a light lunch in the MAC Lower Lobby.
12:00pm: Pieter Broucke’s talk in MAC 125
12:30pm: Gallery Walk of Visions of Grandeur with Pieter
1:00pm: Lunch in the MAC Lower Lobby
This event is free and open to all, but $5 donations are welcome.
Join the Friends of the Art Museum as we consider our next gift to the Museum’s collection. Jerry Philogene, Chair of Black Studies, will present three works of art for possible purchase, and the members of the Friends will vote to determine which work gets added to the collection. The evening will also feature a buffet dinner and card bar (debit/credit cards only, cash not accepted – each event ticket will include one free drink).
If you’re not currently a member of the Friends, be sure to activate or renew your membership to guarantee you’ll be able to vote.
Saskia Wilson-Brown, Founder and Executive Director of the Institute for Art and Olfaction, will offer a special tour of Le Petit Salon and afterward will lead a scent workshop in the former café space in the MAC lobby. Students only! Space is limited. Information on reservations will be released soon.
Join the Friends of the Art Museum for the first in a series of four local artist studio visits available to members this winter and spring. This first visit takes us to Vermont photographer Jim Westphalen’s Shelburne studio where members will have the opportunity to tour the artist’s work space and hear about his latest body of work, his process, and his path to becoming one of the premier fine art photographers in Vermont.
Group size for this visit is limited to 8 people, so Jim has kindly agreed to offer two tours, one in the morning (10:30) and one in the afternoon (1:00). Sign up is on a first come, first served basis (please indicate whether you have flexibility to join either tour, or only one) by either email or phone to Francisca Drexel: fdrexel@middlebury.edu or (802) 443-2369. A final list of participants will be shared with the group so that those wanting to carpool can make arrangements.
After the morning visit, the group is invited to join us for a complimentary snack or lunch at Le Marche, 5597 Shelburne Road, Shelburne. The afternoon group will enjoy tea and sweet treats at Jim Westphalen’s studio.
Fine art photographer Jim Westphalen’s current body of work focuses on rural New England and the iconic structures that inhabit this rugged landscape. Westphalen strives to provide a visual history of these structures as they slowly decay and disappear and to honor their beauty and importance in our landscape. His unique process and presentation of each photograph allow the viewer to connect intimately with each piece and to feel the dramatic impact of the composition. Jim has worked as a professional photographer for more than thirty years. His work is exhibited widely throughout the United States and is held in both private and corporate collections nationally.
Please join us for a gallery talk by photographer Hunter Barnes as he discusses the exhibition A World Away and shares the details of his experience in Sri Lanka.
A reception with refreshments will follow in the Mahaney Arts Center Lower Lobby from 5:30 to 7:00pm.
Director Richard Saunders will moderate a conversation between Garrett MacLean ’99 and John Bell ’73 as they discuss the special exhibition Apocalypse Road Show: On Tour with the Bread and Puppet Theater. Garrett MacLean is a professional photographer who traveled with Bread and Puppet Theater for more than three months during the fall of 2022. John Bell is a puppeteer and former member of the company.
The discussion will run from 5pm—5:45pm in the upper gallery, and the reception will follow from 5:45pm—6:30pm in the lower reception area of the museum.
This event is free and open to the public, but attendance is limited to twenty guests and reservations are required. Please reserve your spot here: https://forms.gle/JqtnSYySgXrL2byg9.
After several years in the works, the Museum is excited to present An Invitation to Awe, curated by Associate Professor of the History of Art and Architecture Katy Smith Abbott in collaboration with her students and colleagues. In this exhibition, older paintings and prints are displayed in conversation with contemporary objects, scientific equipment, and interactive work that compels the viewer to think of how awe is experienced through senses other than sight and to expand their own understanding of where awe lives now. Professor Smith Abbott will give a talk about the making of the exhibition at 5:30pm, followed by hors d’oeuvres and drinks (cash bar) at 6pm.
In his prints, sculptures, and films, multi-disciplinary artist Dario Robleto incorporates a deep fascination with science, history, sound, medicine, and human empathy. His 2024 film, Ancient Beacons Long for Notice, is currently installed at the Middlebury College Museum of Art as part of the exhibit, An Invitation to Awe. He will join Guest Curator Katy Smith Abbott in conversation, as they explore Robleto’s conviction that “awe is a courtship with the unknown.” Cosponsored by the Department of History of Art and Architecture.
Join us for a talk by Rose-Lynn Fisher, an artist featured in the exhibition An Invitation to Awe, who uses microscope, camera, and mixed media to explore the realms within realms we inhabit, in work that evokes a continuum of interconnections and wonder. Afterward, stay for conversation over a light lunch in the MAC Lower Lobby. Cosponsored by the Department of History of Art and Architecture.
This event is free and open to all, but $5 donations are welcome.
Join the Friends of the Art Museum as we consider our next gift to the museum’s collection. Assistant Professor of Psychology Mike Dash will present three works of art for possible purchase, and the members of the Friends will vote to determine which work gets added to the collection. The evening will also feature a buffet dinner and cash bar (each event ticket will include one free drink).
If you’re not currently a member of the Friends, be sure to activate or renew your membership to guarantee you’ll be able to vote.
The Detroit Institute of Arts has one of the best collections of historic American art in the world, with a particular strength in the period 1660 to 1915. Kenneth Myers, curator of American Art and longtime head of the department of American Art, will discuss the ideas informing the recent reinstallation of the collection which is organized chrono-thematically to highlight ways in which art objects reinforced or challenged culturally dominant assumptions about gender, race, and Americanness.
The photographs of Lebanese Palestinian American artist Rania Matar tell the stories of young women through portraits taken throughout Lebanon, France, Egypt, and the United States. Photographed through car windows, in abandoned buildings, snow-strewn fields, or floating in the Mediterranean Sea, the women collaborate with Matar, sharing a sense of creative agency. These large-scale color photographs portray individuality intimately tied to the histories and connections of place.
The panel discussion portion of this event has been canceled due to artist travel and winter weather. However, the reception will still go on as scheduled, from 5:30–7:00 PM. See the new exhibition, enjoy hors d’oeuvres in the lobby (cash bar), and learn about the exhibit from Curator of Collections and Director of Engagement Jodi Rodgers.
Lebanese Palestinian American artist Rania Matar, whose photographs are currently on view in the museum, will discuss the images and origins of her series SHE.
Following her lecture, there will be light refreshments and a chance to mingle with the artist in the lower lobby of the Mahaney Arts Center.
There is a clear distinction between pre-colonial and post-colonial South American art, particularly in terms of medium. The most obvious difference is the shift from stonework or textiles to paintings, but perhaps the most significant change lies in the subject matter and underlying ideology. Our Lady of Cocharcas, the museum’s recently acquired 18th century painting, serves as a prime example of how forced cultural hybridity influenced artistic production in colonial territories like Peru.
When this painting was created, independence was still over a century away, yet the indigenous population was far from passive, actively rebelling against Spanish rule. Art was a powerful tool of the Spanish Empire, used to foster national pride and maintain colonial control, as seen in the way the Virgin stands over both the people and the landscape. However, an alternate interpretation of the painting suggests that the local community adopted sacred European figures to feign subservience while subtly asserting their own identity.
Join the Friends of the Art Museum for our Annual Dinner where we drink, dine, mingle, and enjoy a special presentation. This year, we’re celebrating the past, present, and future of the museum. Associate Curator of Ancient Art Pieter Broucke will detail recent research which resulted in the reattribution of a black-figure white-ground lekythos, the first object the Friends gifted to the museum in 1969 (get a sneak peak on our blog). We’ll also be graced with a student dance performance and welcome Katy Smith Abbott as the museum’s new interim director.
Hors d’oeuvres and drinks begin at 5pm (cash bar, one free drink per event ticket). A buffet-style dinner will be served at 5:30 followed by dessert and the evening’s program.
If you’re not currently a member of the Friends, be sure to activate or renew your membership to guarantee you’ll be able to attend.
Franklin Environmental Center, The Orchard-Hillcrest 103
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center 125
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center 125
Closed to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Twilight Auditorium 101
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center Lower Lobby
Open to the Public
Free
Robert A. Jones '59 Conference Room
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center Lower Lobby
Mahaney Arts Center Lower Lobby
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center Lower Lobby
Free
Mahaney Arts Center Lower Lobby
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center Lower Lobby
Open to the Public
Free; registration required for workshops: go/inkyo
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Free
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Davis Family Library 105A
Closed to the Public
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Free; advance registration required
Mahaney Arts Center 125
Closed to the Public
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Free; registration and membership required
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Axinn Center 229
Open to the Public
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center 125
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
Mahaney Arts Center, Museum of Art
Open to the Public
Free
