Museum of Fine Arts Ghent
Flanders can come home to you! A virtual tour of the exhibition Van Eyck. An Optical Revolution, is available – led by exhibition co-curator Till-Holger Borchert, immediately followed by a Q&A with co-curator Frederica Van Dam. The tour will first be broadcast live April 8th at 1 PM EST on the Flemish Masters Facebook page, and will later be shared on YouTube. This is a rare opportunity, as eight panels of the Ghent Altarpiece are displayed together for the first time in a museum and over half of Jan van Eyck’s twenty surviving paintings and drawings will also be shown. Learn a bit more about the exhibit before the premiere here.
Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts
In addition to an incredibly comprehensive collection of objects made and used in the early American South that are a pleasure to browse, MESDA has a variety of online exhibitions and assembled virtual tours to explore. TMA favorites include:
- “The Neatest Pieces of Any Description“: Furniture of Piedmont North Carolina, 1780-1860: a title that neatly speaks for itself, with Piedmont furniture needing little else to recommend it. Among the items, the blanket chest and cellaret have particularly engaging histories.
- For those who enjoyed Joseph Cunningham’s discussion of Boston’s Paul Revere Pottery, MESDA’s James River Valley Stoneware exhibition may also be of interest. In From Kaolin to Claymount: Demystifying James River Valley Stoneware, a number ofmakers, forms, and styles of the hybrid tradition are displayed. John Poole Schermerhorn’s work is, of course, a standout. But the work of Stephen B. Sweeney and others is also worth a visit.
- Should you enjoy the stoneware exhibition, consider exploring the Virtual Tour: Mariner Southern Ceramics Gallery; which include some of the most significant works and a comprehensive look at many forms in ceramics of the American South. Those who follow us on Instagram may recall seeing this earthenware Squirrel Bottle – an absolute delight fired with a green lead glaze.
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Where to begin with the many online offerings of the Met? Two of this week’s highlights:
- Something to Watch: The Met has released one full-length opera via MetLiveArts, that is available on YouTube. In The Mother of Us All: An opera by Gertrude Stein and Virgil Thomson the story of Susan B. Anthony and the women’s suffrage movement is imaginatively told by some incredible young voices. Another full length feature will be available soon; this time, the exclusive digital premiere of Gerhard Richter Painting, directed by Corinna Belz, which was featured in the exhibition Gerhard Richter: Painting After All at The Met Breuer, will take place on Saturday, April 11, 7 p.m. on The Met’s website, where it will remain available to stream through early July.
- Something to Read: If you are short on reading material, you’ll be pleased to learn that MetPublications is regularly releasing out-of-print titles for free download. Recent releases include “Rooms with a View: The Open Window in the Nineteenth Century” (2011), “The Tale of Genji: A Japanese Classic Illuminated” (2019), “Dawn of Egyptian Art” (2012), and “German Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1350-1600” (2013).
Contemporary Jewish Museum
Levi Strauss: A History of American Style is the largest public display of the company’s archival materials ever assembled. Sammy Dalati explored this exhibition for us, sharing that “there’s something cyberpunk about Levi’s jeans: their signature metal rivets, which became part of the package in 1873, were the first machined metal pieces to be incorporated into garments (no more horn, wood, or mother-of-pearl necessary).” Originally scheduled to run until August 9 at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco, it recently went virtual.”
To experience the exhibition in sequential order, rather than browsing, click “More” and then click “Slideshow.”
Reynolda House Museum of American Art
Reynolda is continuing to expand its virtual program offerings, this week introducing “Call-a-Curator” – a video series that sheds light on new aspects of the estate, its collections, and its storied history. In the first video, Reynolda’s director of the archives and library, Bari Helms, discusses 19th century response to illnesses, and in the second curator Allison Slaby discusses renowned portraitist Gilbert Stuart. For the latest, be sure to follow Reynolda on YouTube, and check this playlist weekly.
Short and Sweet: Bard Graduate Center
Bard Graduate Center launched One More Thing on April 6th; an Instagram Stories feature which examines one object, with one person, for one minute. To follow along, find Bard Graduate Center on Instagram on your phone, and check their “Instagram Stories tab” daily. It’s sure to make you smile. Should you need more Bard content to fill a few more minutes, you can also read Katherine Lanza’s discussion of their Eileen Gray exhibition here.
