The Harvard Art Museums today announced their intention to reopen to the public on Saturday, September 4, 2021. Advance reservations will be required for visitors and will be available up to three weeks in advance. Reservations can be made on the museum’s website from August 20. A limited number of tickets may also be available each day for walk-in visitors. Along with reopening plans, the museums are also pleased to announce a new “Free Sunday” initiative. The museums will offer preview days for members and supporters on Thursday and Friday September 2 and 3, before opening to the general public on September 4.
“We are delighted to reopen to all visitors after the extraordinary events of the past year and a half,” said Martha Tedeschi, Director of Elizabeth and John Moors Cabot. “I am extremely proud of the efforts of our talented and dedicated staff, who have helped make museums a vital resource through online programs, even when our doors are closed.” She continued, “It is with great joy that we now look forward to welcoming everyone to visit in person, whether you know us well or are visiting for the first time. Calderwood’s beloved galleries, study rooms and courtyard have been re-energized with you in mind.
A new “Free Sundays” program will be launched when the museums reopen in September. Advance reservations will be required on Sunday until further notice. Every Sunday, the museums will offer free entry to all visitors; this new program complements pre-existing free museum entry opportunities, which extend to holders of a Harvard ID card, all students (regardless of institution), members of the art museums of Harvard, young people under the age of 18, and all Cambridge residents, among others. In addition to free entry, Cambridge residents can also enjoy additional benefits by joining the museums’ new Cambridge Friends program. As part of this free program, the Cambridge Friends will receive the museum newsletter, invitations to certain Friends programs and a discount in the museum shop, among other benefits. The museum store and Jenny’s Cafe are both slated to reopen in the fall.
“We see the reopening as an opportunity to provide additional access points that facilitate the visit,” said Tedeschi. “Our online museum community has grown exponentially while we were closed due to the pandemic, and now we want to turn our attention to the warmest possible invitation to every museum visitor, whether new or old.”
In accordance with Harvard University policies and guidelines, the museums have been closed since March 2020. Upon reopening, the museums will operate at reduced capacity to prioritize the health and safety of visitors, staff and the community. campus in the broad sense. Other useful information for visitors, including additional health and safety measures, is regularly updated on the museum’s website. Visitors are encouraged to view the website when planning their visit.
On display this fall
Four new exhibitions and many new gallery installations will be presented this fall at the Harvard Art Museums:
Devouring the Land: War and American Landscape Photography Since 1970
From September 17, 2021 to January 16, 2022, Gallery of Special Exhibitions
Devour the earth highlights the unintended and often hidden consequences of militarism on habitats and well-being in the United States. Showcasing approximately 160 photographs by 60 artists, the exhibit reveals the national footprint of the U.S. military, the vast network of industries that support and provide its work, and the impacts and responses to this activity. How do photographs represent environmental damage that can be difficult to see, let alone identify and measure? By asking such questions, the exhibition offers visitors a space to consider our current challenges and our common future. At the same time, the works on display also suggest how preparations for war and its aftermath can sometimes lead to surprising examples of ecological regeneration and change.
States of the game: prints from Rembrandt to Delsarte
September 4, 2021 – January 2, 2022, University Research Gallery
Spanning more than three centuries, the works in this exhibition – by artists such as Pablo Picasso, Rembrandt, Lee Krasner, Jacques Philippe Le Bas, and Louis Delsarte – unveil the layers of creative revision, correction and adjustment behind finished prints. At the heart of this process is the concept of ‘print state’, which traditionally refers to a version of a print that precedes the final product. The exhibition explores how artists over time have maximized the iterative potential of states, for reasons ranging from the practical to the whimsical. By decoding the creative choices that the artist has pursued or abandoned at each successive stage, the exhibition makes it possible to discover the full extent of the experiment and to demystify the terminology and techniques of printmaking.
A visual arts colloquium
From September 4, 2021 to January 2, 2022, University Teaching Gallery
This installation supports Harvard’s Humanities 20 course, an introduction to the study of the humanities through major works of art and architecture from around the world: everything from ancient Persian sculpture to modern stop-motion photography . The course is taught by six Harvard faculty members: Jinah Kim, Joseph Koerner, Ewa Lajer-Burcharth, Yukio Lippit, Jennifer Roberts, and David Roxburgh.
Crop
In progress; Phase 1 in sight from September 4, 2021
Harvard Art Museums’ new ReFrame initiative aims to reinvent the function, role and future of the university art museum. Crop sheds light on difficult stories, investigates untold stories, and experiments with different approaches to storytelling. The initiative seeks to inspire, challenge and connect museum visitors, asking visitors to think about which artists, which groups of people and which cultures are visible or invisible. Ultimately, the initiative is designed to build a community around these experiences with museum collections. This fall, visitors will experience several initial ReFrame installations, which include modifications to key works in highly visible and heavily trafficked areas of museums. Works of art identified as part of the ReFrame project include:
–The Long Term Loan of Kehinde Wiley’s Painting Portrait of Asia-Imani, Gabriella-Esnae and Kaya Palmer (2020), from the artist’s recent series Yellow wallpaper; new on the 1330 gallery from September 4.
–The 1985 sculpture Dibujo sin Papel 85/1 (Drawing without Paper 85/1) by Venezuelan artist Gego (Gertrude Goldschmidt), made with found materials (wire, string, wood and aluminum tubes) to create an organic form that marries the language of structure with a sense of experimentation; acquired in 2020 and visible again in Gallery 1110 from September 4.
–A selection of black and white photographs of students from nearby Cambridge Rindge and Latin School in 1981, taken by Linda Benedict Jones for her portfolio CRLS; acquired in 2019 and visible again in Gallery 1320 from September 4.
–Video by David Hammons Without Phat (1995/1999), the artist’s only known video work and a layered rumination of life on the fringes and the simple beauty of casual daily encounters; on short-term exhibition in gallery 1120 from September 4th.
–A reinstallation of German expressionist funds, locating Emil Nolde’s painting Mulatto (1913) and its unnamed subject in the context of the Black German experience and the infamous Nazi “Degenerate Art” campaign; on view in Gallery 1500 from September 4.
–An installation of Ahuramazda in the winged disc, a fragment of limestone relief from the 5th century BC. to be seen in the neighboring galleries 3440 and 3460 from September 4th.
–The new installation “Female Artists — or Simply Artists? »Featuring 18th-century prints by seven printmakers, many of whom are little known today, one of three concurrent exhibitions critically examining the terminology, setting and issues used to discuss women artists in printmaking; exhibited in galleries 2220, 2400 and 2540 from September 4.
–A stoneware pot by David Drake, an African-American slave potter working in South Carolina in the mid-19th century; to be seen in Galerie 2100 from mid-September.
–A newly renovated Japanese painting gallery with works by Okuhara Seiko, Kano Sansetsu and Okutani Shuseki, highlighting all the major modern painting formats and creative “frames” through which we encounter them today; exhibited in Galerie 2600 from December.
These represent only the first efforts to reorient museum collections towards today’s concerns; more work will be added as the project grows and expands.
Krzysztof Wodiczko: Portrait
October 14, 2021 – April 17, 2022, Gallery 1120 (Level 1)
Explore the state of democracy today through a work of art commissioned by internationally renowned artist Krzysztof Wodiczko, presented at Harvard Art Museums in partnership with Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Pre-recorded video interviews capturing voices and opinions from all political backgrounds will activate Harvard Art Museums’ iconic portrait George washington (c. 1795) by Gilbert Stuart, promoting an exchange of views and responses in this period of heightened political division. The design school will present a career preview of Wodiczko’s work in its own galleries later in the fall.
