Preservation is one of the key missions of a museum. A museum’s preservation and conservation efforts are therefore often closely intertwined with the history of the museum. Conservation departments not only care for the objects in a collection but also strive to preserve the tangible and anecdotal information that documents how these efforts were carried out in the past, and by whom. Bart Devolder, conservator at the Art Museum, will elaborate on the past preservation efforts of the Princeton University Art Museum and situate the Museum in the broader picture of the history of conservation in the United States. 
Late Thursdays: Art Making
Drawing: Light, Values, and ShadingThursday, June 11, 8 p.m. |
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The Art Museum is partnering with the Arts Council of Princeton to provide free online art-making experiences. Weekly classes are taught by artist-instructor Barbara DiLorenzo over Zoom, so participants can join live from their home computers; techniques emphasize drawing with pen or pencil on paper. Each week’s lesson features artworks from the Museum’s collections.
In this session, we will focus on learning the value scale and how to apply those light and dark tones to various shapes to create a three-dimensional effect. We will turn a circle into a sphere with shading and then look for places we can use that technique in representing elements from a still life. 
Screening Room
Creation Myths: A Conversation with Artist Hugh Hayden |
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In this hour-long video, hear artist Hugh Hayden recorded live in conversation with Professor Chika Okeke-Agulu, who specializes in indigenous, modern, and contemporary African and African Diaspora art history and theory. They discuss the development, process, and installation of Creation Myths, Hayden’s site-responsive installations exploring history, identity, and the creation of the America we know today. 
Save the Date
For the Birds: Representing Nature from Saint Francis to Pope Francis
Thursday, June 18, 5:30 p.m. |
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Using Laudato Si’, Pope Francis’s recent encyclical on the environment, as a point of departure, this talk explores the changing representation of his namesake, Saint Francis, from the thirteenth to the twenty-first century, examining how evolving ideas about the human-nature relationship are expressed in images of the patron saint of ecology. Presented by Karl Kusserow, John Wilmerding Curator of American Art. 
Collection Spotlight
Transforming Landscapes |
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Students in Professor Anna Arabindan-Kesson’s course “Seeing to Remember: Representing Slavery Across the Black Atlantic,” curated this installation, which includes photographs recently acquired by the Museum to expand engagement with the visual history of slavery in the United States. The artworks selected span multiple time periods, from the eighteenth century to the present day, and depict both the physical and the metaphorical space that Black people occupy in the United States and the Caribbean. They represent both the lived realities of enslavement and the aftermath of plantation life. The students wrote, “These works of art also compel us—in sometimes difficult ways—to confront the historical horrors of slavery and, as the photograph by Danny Lyon reminds us, its continuing legacies today.” 
Art for Families—Anytime, Anywhere
Degas's Dancers and Bierstadt's Landscapes |
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Kids home? Missing the Museum? Families can enjoy our online art education activities anywhere. This week, learn about Edgar Degas, an artist who enjoyed painting, drawing, and sculpting ballerinas, capturing their energy and movement. Then download the ballet-inspired craft to create your own beautiful dancer. And learn about Albert Bierstadt, famous for painting the American West. Then create a 3-D landscape of your own.
Image credits
Margo Allen, In Mexico, 20th century. Princeton University Art Museum. Bequest of Dan Fellows Platt, Class of 1895
Master of the Bardi, Saint Francis, altar panel, ca. 1265. Bardi Chapel, Santa Croce, Florence
Romare Bearden, Moon and Two Suns, 1971. Princeton University Art Museum. Gift of The American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, Childe Hassam Fund. Art © Romare Bearden Foundation/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY
Edgar Degas, Dancers, ca. 1899. Princeton University Art Museum. Bequest of Henry K. Dick, Class of 1909 |
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