newsletter - issue 41

The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art

NEWSLETTERYale University January 2015 Issue 41

Director of Studies: Mark Hallett Deputy Director of Studies: Martin Postle

Assistant Director for Finance and Administration: Sarah Ruddick Assistant Director for Research: Sarah Victoria Turner

Advisory Council: Iwona Blazwick, Alixe Bovey, David Peters Corbett, Penelope Curtis, Anthony Geraghty, Michael Hatt,

Nigel Llewellyn, Richard Marks, A ndrew Moore, A ndrew Saint, Shearer West, A lison Yarrington

Company Registered in England 983028 Registered Charity 3138

The Paul Mellon Centre 16 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3JA Tel: 020 7580 0311 Fax: 020 7636 6730 www.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk

Since 1996 the Centre has been situated in ahandsome Georgian townhouse at number 16Bedford Square, a development which was lauded atthe time of its construction in the late eighteenthcentury as ‘without exception the most perfectsquare’ in London. Now, owing to a pressing need toexpand our facilities – and a desire to remain in thepresent location – the Centre is to expand into theadjoining property at number 15, the two buildingsbeing brought together to provide an enhancedspace and improved facilities for our readers andthose who attend our ambitious programme ofacademic events.

The complexities and sensitivities involved inuniting two historic Grade I listed properties havebeen at the forefront of the expansion project. TheCentre is therefore delighted to have secured theservices of the architects, Wright and Wright, whohave extensive experience in projects of this delicate nature, notably joining together fourtownhouses on the west side of Bedford Square forthe Architectural Association.

While respecting the historic interiors andintegrity of numbers 15 and 16 Bedford Square, theexpanded premises of the Paul Mellon Centre willprovide improved storage and readers’ facilities for our growing library and archives collections,new lecture rooms and seminar rooms, as well as adedicated common room and lecture room for ourYale in London programme, which will serveundergraduates from Yale University.

As a result of the expansion, and the relatedconstruction and refurbishment, we will be closed tothe public until late summer 2015.

During the renovation period regular updatesabout the Centre’s activities, its staff, collections, and

Front elevation, 15–16 Bedford Square © Wright & Wright Architects

The Paul Mellon Centre – A New Chapter

external events programmes will be published on ourwebsite, blog (http://blog.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk),and social media platforms. We will share news of theprogrammes that will continue to receive our support,and report upon some exciting online developments atthe Paul Mellon Centre.

THe PAUL MeLLON CeNTRe COLLECTIONS

The expansion of the Paul Mellon Centre creates a fantastic opportunity to

improve resources for the Centre’s Library, Archives and Photographic

Archive, readers and staff. Space has been a particular issue as the collections

have grown considerably over the past twenty years and have completely filled

No. 16 Bedford Square, spreading throughout almost all the rooms.

With this in mind, when the expansion project started, the Librarian and

Archivist surveyed all of the material and requested that the architects try to

provide twenty years’ worth of expansion space. Better facilities for readers

and staff as well as increased security for the collections were also required.

The architects have produced plans that will bring all the material together

in the lower ground floor and Collections staff will be accommodated in new

offices there, with more space to work. The Archive and some of the Library

will be stored in mobile shelving with improved temperature and humidity

control. Other exciting developments include an exhibition area to display

collections material, as well as improved facilities for researchers such as extra

material on open access and a designated area to have a drink and eat lunch.

As the building work will be so extensive, it was decided to move the

Collections out of the building for the duration. In preparation for the move,

the material has been assessed and sorted, the Library and Photographic

Archive have been cleaned, and many books and journals have been bound.

The Archives have been re-organised, and much material has been sent for

conservation.

Jamie Briggs, a removals company with experience of moving library

collections, was selected and discussions began to prepare the move. The

building, a five-storey Georgian townhouse, with no lift, posed considerable

access issues. An external lift (one of only four in the country) was used to

remove material through upper windows and down to the lorry below.

The move, which saw approximately one kilometre of books, journals,

photographic images and archive material packed up and moved offsite in only

five days, was a huge success and it is all now in secure specialist storage with

appropriate environmental conditions.

Collections staff are now looking forward to moving everything back in to

new and improved storage areas and re-opening the Public Study Room in 2015.

Collections Expansion Project

The Centre hosted a number of study days and

workshops for researchers and curators in the autumn

term, including one at the National Museum of Wales to

coincide with the Richard Wilson and the Transformation ofEuropean Landscape Painting exhibition; a brainstorming

meeting for curators and researchers associated with

Gainsborough’s House in Suffolk; a workshop on the topic

of Moral Painting and Social Satire around 1750: Hogarthand Europe at Tate Britain; an exhibition development

workshop at the V&A entitled The Work of England:Luxury Embroideries of the Middle Ages 1170–1539; and a

scholars’ morning for the Constable: The Making of aMaster exhibition at the V&A.

The autumn term Research Seminar series, which focused

on art and visual culture in the twentieth century, took

place on consecutive Wednesday evenings in October.

Professor Lynda Nead, Professor Anne Wagner and

Professor Lisa Tickner were the trio of distinguished

scholars who gave exciting and thought-provoking papers.

We collaborated with British Museum curators Lloyd de

Beer and Naomi Speakman and academic advisors,

Professor Sandy Heslop and Dr Jessica Berenbeim, on

Invention and Imagination in British Architecture 600 – 1500,a conference at the British Museum (30 October–1

November). The event sold out and was an extremely lively

gathering of students, curators and researchers in the

field.

Research Events, September to December 2014

Part of the Paul Mellon Centre Archive is

moved from the top floor of No. 16 Bedford

Square to street level.

Photograph: Frankie Drummond-Charig

ACADEMIC ACTIVITIES THe PAUL MeLLON CeNTRe

THE PAUL MELLON LECTURES 2015Penelope Curtis, Director of Tate Britain

Sculpture on the ThresholdMondays, 19 January–16 February 2015, 6.30–7.30 pm, Sainsbury Wing Theatre, The National Gallery

This series of five lectures, sponsored by the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies

in British Art, takes a wide-ranging look at the underlying forms of

sculpture. Focusing on four key aspects – the vertical, the horizontal, the

closed and the open – the lectures explore sculptural forms across time, and

suggest fundamental continuities. Taking examples from the early medieval

to the present, and looking at utilitarian as well as idealising formulae, the

series suggests that we bring a deep subliminal understanding to our

experience of sculpture, and that sculpture occupies a position on the

physical and conceptual threshold of our familiar world.

Penelope Curtis, now Director of Tate Britain, has published principally on

sculpture after Rodin, but as curator of the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds

she also developed a wide-ranging programme examining the materials and

meanings of sculpture across time and place. These lectures draw on that

experience.

19 January: The Vertical (From Nelson’s Column to the Ruthwell Monument)

26 January: The Horizontal (From Westminster Abbey to Keith Arnatt)

2 February: The Closed (From Pandora’s Box to Damien Hirst)

9 February: The Open (From Martin Creed to Castle Howard)

16 February: The ensemble (From Bethan Huws to Rilke’s Rodin)Harry Bates, Pandora, exhibited 1891Photo: © Tate, London 2014

Whilst the Centre is closed, we are collaborating on a

number of events off-site, details of which can be found

on our website.

In partnership with the National Gallery and Birkbeck,

University of London, the Centre is co-organising a major

conference, Animating the Eighteenth-Century Country House(5–6 March 2015). Mark Hallett and Sarah Turner are

convening a panel at the next Association of Art

Historians conference which will be held at the University

of east Anglia from 9–11 April. Their panel, British Artthrough its Exhibition Histories, 1760 to now, will take

exhibition culture as a lens through which to examine the

history, presentation, marketing and reception of British

art, both in the UK and internationally.

Research Programme Spring 2015

Tickets are available now at £6 (£4 concessions) per lecture:

Online: via The National Gallery

http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/whats-on/calendar/paul-mellon-lecture-19-january-2015

In person: Tickets can be purchased on the door

Invention and Imagination in British Architecture 600 – 1500 conference at

the British Museum

CURATORIAL ReSeARCH GRANTS

Compton Verney to help support a research curator for 8

months to work on the project Hart Silversmiths: A Legacy

The Foundling Museum to help support a research curator

for 1 year to work on the project The Fallen Woman

Gainsborough’s House to help support a research curator

for 1 year to work on the project Cataloguing andResearching the Collection of Gainsborough’s House

Greenwich Foundation for the Old Royal Naval College to

help support a research curator for 1 year to work on the

project Painted Hall Conservation: Understanding Sir JamesThornhill’s Masterpiece

National Museums Liverpool to help support a research

curator for 1 year to work on the project Online Dictionaryof the Liverpool Autumn Exhibitions and Spring Exhibitions(1871–1938)

The National Trust to help support a research curator for

3 years to work on the project National Trust FurnitureResearch, Publication and Online Catalogue Project

Nottingham City Museums and Galleries to help support

a research curator for 1 year to work on the project TheBallantyne Collection of 20th-century British Studio Ceramics

Turner Contemporary to help support a research curator

for 1 year to work on the project The Waste Land

University College London to help support a research

curator for 1 year to work on the project Cultural Legaciesof British Slave-Ownership

PUBLICATION GRANTS (AUTHOR)

Mirjam Brusius: The Absence of Photography: WilliamHenry Fox Talbot, Photography and the Antique

Sacha Craddock: The Contemporary Art Society: A Biography

James Delbourgo: The Man Who Collected the World: SirHans Sloane and the Origins of the British Museum

John Hannavy: The Victorian Photographs of Dr ThomasKeith and John Forbes White

Karen Hearn: Cornelius Johnson

Owen Hopkins: From the Shadows: The Architecture andAfterlife of Nicholas Hawksmoor

Samuel Shaw: From Bradford to Benares: The Art ofWilliam Rothenstein

Mark Swenarton: Cook’s Camden: The Housing Programmeof the London Borough of Camden under Sydney Cook1965–73

Nick Thurston: Somebody’s Got To Do It: Selected Writingsby Pavel Büchler since 1986

Beth Williamson: Between Art Practice and PsychoanalysisMid-20th Century: Anton Ehrenzweig in Context

George Younge: Old English Sources of the TheologicalWindows at Canterbury Cathedral (1174–c.1200)

THe PAUL MeLLON CeNTRe GRANTS

Grant AwardsAt the October 2014 meeting of the Centre’s Advisory Council the following Fellowships and Grants were awarded:

PUBLICATION GRANTS (PUBLISHeR)

Afterall: Designing Exhibitions, Exhibiting Participation:‘an Exhibit’ 1957

Boydell and Brewer Ltd: The Art of the Church Screen inMedieval Europe (Making, Meaning, Preservation)

Corpus Vitrearum Medii Aevi: The Stained Glass ofHerkenrode Abbey in England

Dulwich Picture Gallery: Winifred Knights 1899–1947

Heraldry Society: The Display of Heraldry: The HeraldicImagination in Arts and Culture, 1500 to the Present Day

Lund Humphries Publishers: Edward Ardizzone

National Museums Scotland enterprises Ltd: ScottishPhotography: The First Thirty Years

Pallant House Gallery: Leon Underwood: PioneerModernist

Paul Holberton Publishing: Cornelius Johnson

Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies: The SmithfieldDecretals (BL, Royal MS 10 E IV): Tales from the Margins ofa 14th-century Law Book

Russell-Cotes Art Gallery & Museum: Slade Painters inDorset: The Edwardians

Society of Antiquaries of Scotland: Scottish Glass1750–2006

The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, University of

Leeds: George Morland: Art, Traffic and Society in late18th-century England

UCL Press: Project 75

University of Greenwich Galleries: Stockwell Depot(1967–1982) and The London Artists’ Studio Movement

Walpole Society: The British in Spain

Williamson Art Gallery and Museum: From Renaissanceto Regent Street: The Della Robbia Pottery and the Influence ofthe Cultural Tourist

ReSeARCH SUPPORT GRANTS

Juliet Davis for research on Dispersal: A Landscape on theEdge

Natasha eaton for research on The Conditional Image:Art, Indenture and Empire in the Indian Ocean,c.1780–c.1947

James Finch for research on David Sylvester: Art Writings

Clare Griffiths for research on Clare Leighton(1898–1949): A Life Engraved

Sharon Irish for research on Stephen Willats, 1970–2012:Coded Landscapes, Cybernetic Towers, and Urban Journeys

Sandro Jung for research on Thomas Stothard,18th-Century Book Illustration, and his Designs for JamesHarrison, Thomas Cadell, and William Davies

FORTHCOMING PUBLICATIONS THe PAUL MeLLON CeNTRe

31 January 2015 is the closing date for applications

for the next round of Fellowships and Grants.

See details and application forms at

www.paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk/259/

Sherry Lindquist for research on Nude Trinities andOther Anomalies in Books of Hours made for the ButlerFamily of London

Claudia Marx for research on The Restoration of MajorMedieval Churches in Victorian England and Wales

Nathan O’Donnell for research on BLAST and the‘Springs of Creation’: An Investigation of Vorticism, IrishArt and the Connections between Wyndham Lewis & EileenGray

Judy Raymond for research on The Colour of Shadows:Richard Bridgens and his Images of Slavery in Trinidad

Maria Stavrinaki for research on Prehistoric Modern. Thedifferent Uses of Prehistory by ‘Force One’ and theIndependent Group

Mengting Yu for research on Women Artists, the AvantGarde and London: 1901–1914

eDUCATIONAL PROGRAMMe GRANTS

Art Institute of Chicago towards a two-day symposium

Ireland: Art on a World Stage, 1690–1840, 20–21 March

2015

Birkbeck College and Tate towards a two-day

symposium Artist and Empire: New Perspectives, 1780 toNow, 27–28 Nov 2015

Bristol Museum and Art Gallery towards a seminar Howto Interpret Art and the British Empire for 21st-centuryAudiences: Roderick MacKenzie’s Delhi Durbar of 1903 in

Bristol Museum & Art Gallery, mid-February 2015

Centre for eighteenth-Century Studies, University of

York towards a three-day international conference

Disseminating Dress: Britain and the World, 28–30 May

2015

Victoria & Albert Museum towards a two-day

symposium A Collector of Secrets: Sir Balthazar Gerbier(1592–1663) in Cultural Diplomacy and the Arts, 4–5 June

2015

ANDReW WYLD ReSeARCH SUPPORT GRANTS

(funded by the Andrew Wyld Fund)

Ben Pollitt for research on The Drawings andWatercolours of Kamchatka by John Webber

Marrikka Trotter for research on Creative Landscapes:Geology and Architecture in Robert Adam’s LateWatercolours

BARNS-GRAHAM ReSeARCH SUPPORT GRANT

(funded by the Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Charitable

Trust)

Beth Williamson for research on America in the Borders:William Johnstone’s Landscape Painting

George Romney A Complete Catalogue of His PaintingsAlex Kidson

This magnificent catalogue, in 3 volumes and with

nearly 2,000 illustrations, will restore George Romney

to his long-overdue position – with his contemporaries

Reynolds and Gainsborough – as a master of

18th-century British portrait painting. With this

product of impressive and thorough research

undertaken over the course of twenty years, Alex

Kidson asserts Romney’s status as one of the greatest

British painters, whose last catalogue raisonné was

published over 100 years ago. In more than 1,800

entries, many supported by new photography, Kidson

aims to solve longstanding issues of attribution,

distinguishing genuine pictures by Romney from works

whose traditional attribution to him can no longer be

supported. The author’s insights are guided by rich

primary source material on Romney – including account

books, ledgers, and sketchbooks – as well as secondary

sources such as prints after lost works, newspaper

reports and reviews, and writings by Romney’s

contemporaries.

Alex Kidson is Senior Research Fellow, Paul Mellon

Centre for Studies in British Art, London, and was

curator of the 2002 bi-centenary exhibition GeorgeRomney 1734–1802.

June

960 pp. 305x254mm. 1600 colour + 350 b/w illus

HB Boxed Set ISBN 978-0-300-20969-3

£180.00

THe PAUL MeLLON CeNTRe FORTHCOMING PUBLICATIONS

A Natural History of EnglishGardening 1650–1800Mark Laird

Inspired by the pioneering naturalist

Gilbert White, who viewed natural

history as the common study of

cultural and natural communities,

Mark Laird unearths forgotten

historical data to reveal the complex

visual cultures of early modern

gardening. Ranging from climate

studies to the study of a butterfly’s

life-cycle, this original and fascinating

book examines the scientific quest for

order in nature as an offshoot of

ordering the garden and field. Laird

follows a broad series of

chronological events – from the Little

Ice Age winter of 1683 to the

drought summer of the volcanic 1783

– to probe the nature of gardening

and husbandry, the role of amateurs

in scientific disciplines and the

contribution of women as

gardener-naturalists. Illustrated by a

wealth of visual and literary

materials – paintings, engravings,

poetry, essays and letters, as well as

prosaic household accounts and

nursery bills – the book

fundamentally transforms our

understanding of the english

landscape garden as a powerful

cultural expression..

Mark Laird is an historic landscape

consultant. He teaches landscape

history at Harvard University

Graduate School of Design.

May

448 pp. 290x248 mm. 300 colour + 100 b/w illus.

HB ISBN 978-0-300-19636-8 £45.00

The People’s Galleries: Art Museums and Exhibitions inBritain, 1800–1914Giles Waterfield

This innovative history of British art

museums begins in the early 19th

century. The National Gallery and the

South Kensington Museum (now the

Victoria & Albert Museum) in

London may later have been at the

centre of activity, but museums in

cities such as Glasgow, Leeds,

Liverpool, Manchester and

Nottingham were immensely popular

and attracted enthusiastic audiences.

The People’s Galleries traces the rise of

art museums in Britain through to the

First World War, focusing on the

phenomenon of municipal galleries.

This richly illustrated book argues

that these regional museums

represented a new type of institution:

an art gallery for a working-class

audience, appropriate for the rapidly

expanding cities and shaped by liberal

ideals. As their appeal weakened with

the new century, they adapted and

became more conventional. Using a

wide range of sources, the book

studies the patrons and the publics,

the collecting policies, the temporary

exhibitions, and the architecture of

these institutions, as well as the

complex range of reasons for their

foundation.

Giles Waterfield is an independent

curator and writer.

June

304 pp. 280x245mm. 40 colour + 240 b/w illus.

HB ISBN 978-0-300-20984-6 £45.00

British Silver: State HermitageMuseum CatalogueMarina Lopato

Despite its comparatively small size –

just over 370 items, dating mainly

from the 18th century – the collection

of British silver in the Hermitage is

renowned for its variety and quality.

Over the course of the 18th and 19th

centuries, the introduction of

european dining habits and Russian

Anglophilia contributed to the

acquisition of large quantities of

British silver. Most of the pieces were

functional rather than decorative,

such as dinner or toilet services

specially commissioned by members

of the imperial family and the

aristocracy. Marking the 250th

anniversary of the State Hermitage

Museum, this catalogue offers a grand

presentation of these glorious silver

items, supported by new research and

documents. In her introduction,

Marina Lopato details the

complexities of Russian and

Hermitage history to set the scene for

the objects. Sumptuous illustrations

showcase the exceptional nature of

the Hermitage’s British silver, most

evident in four monumental wine

coolers that are among the best

known pieces of British silver

anywhere in the world.

Marina Lopato is curator of

european silver at the State

Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg.

June


HB ISBN 978-0-300-21320-1 £100.00

FORTHCOMING PUBLICATIONS THe PAUL MeLLON CeNTRe

Arts & Crafts Stained GlassPeter Cormack

Beautifully illustrated and based on

over three decades of research, Artsand Crafts Stained Glass is the first

study of how the late 19th-century

Arts and Crafts Movement

transformed the aesthetics and

production of stained glass in Britain

and America. A progressive school of

artists, committed to direct

involvement both in making and

designing windows, emerged in the

1880s and 1890s, reinventing stained

glass as a modern art form. Using

innovative materials and techniques,

they rejected formulaic Gothic

Revivalism while seeking authentic,

creative inspiration in medieval

traditions. This new approach was

pioneered by Christopher Whall

(1849–1924), whose charismatic

teaching educated a generation of

talented pupils – men and women –

who produced intensely colourful and

inventive stained glass, using

dramatic and often powerfully moving

design and symbolism. Peter Cormack

demonstrates how women made

critical contributions to the renewal

of stained glass, gaining meaningful

equality with their male colleagues,

more than in any other applied art.

Peter Cormack is a noted scholar of

19th- and 20th-century British and

American stained glass, William

Morris, and the Arts and Crafts

Movement.

July


HB ISBN 978-0-300-20970-9. £50.00

The Cobbe Cabinet of Curiosities:An Anglo-Irish Country HouseMuseumedited by Arthur MacGregor

This lavishly produced volume

presents a survey and analysis of a

fascinating cabinet of curiosities

established around 1750 by the Cobbe

family in Ireland and added to over a

period of 100 years. Although such

collections were common in British

country houses during the 18th and

19th centuries, the Cobbe museum,

still largely intact and housed in its

original cabinets, now forms a unique

survivor of this type of private

collection from the Age of

enlightenment. A detailed catalogue

of the objects and specimens is

accompanied by beautiful, specially

commissioned photographs that

showcase the cabinet’s component

elements. Reproductions of portraits

from the extensive collection of the

Cobbe family bring immediacy to the

narrative by illustrating the

personalities involved in the

collection’s development. Included are

essays outlining, among other topics,

the place of the cabinet of curiosities

in enlightenment society and the

history of the Cobbe family. extracts

from the family archive place the

collection in its social context.

Arthur Macgregor retired in 2008

from the Department of Antiquities

in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.

March


HB with slipcase ISBN 978-0-300-20435-3

£75.00

Samuel Palmer: Shadows on the WallWilliam Vaughan

Samuel Palmer was one of the

leading British landscape painters of

the 19th century. Inspired by his

mentor, the artist and poet William

Blake, Palmer brought a new

spiritual intensity to his

interpretation of nature, producing

works of unprecedented boldness

and fervency. Pre-eminent scholar

William Vaughan – who organised

the Palmer retrospective at the

British Museum in 2005 – draws on

unpublished diaries and letters,

offering a fresh interpretation of one

of the most attractive, sympathetic,

yet idiosyncratic figures of the 19th

century. Far from being a recluse, as

he often is presented, Palmer was

actively engaged in Victorian cultural

life and sought to exert a moral

power through his artwork.

Beautifully illustrated with Palmer’s

visionary and enchanted landscapes,

the book contains rich studies of his

work, influences and resources.

Vaughan also shows how, later,

enthralled by the Pre-Raphaelite

movement, Palmer manipulated his

own artistic image to harmonise with

it. Little appreciated in his lifetime,

Palmer is now hailed as a precursor

of modernism in the 20th century.

William Vaughan is professor

emeritus of History of Art at

Birkbeck, University of London.

May


HB ISBN 978-0-300-20985-3 £50.00

ya l e c e n t e r f o r b r i t i s h a r t For complete details of the following exhibitions and programs, please visit britishart.yale.edu, phone +1 203 432 2800, or e-mail [email protected] Chapel Street, New Haven, Connecticut 06520 USA

EXHIBITION

The Critique of Reason: Romantic Art, 1760–1860

6 MARCH—26 JULY, 2015

Yale University Art Gallery 1111 Chapel Street, New Haven

The first major exhibition to be co-organized by the Yale Center for British Art and the Yale University Art Gallery brings together treasures from the collections of both museums. The show comprises works in different media by artists such as David d’Angers, William Blake, John Constable, Honoré Daumier, Eugène Delacroix, Henri Fuseli, Théodore Géricault, Francisco de Goya, and J. M. W. Turner that expand the view of Romanticism as a movement opposed to reason and scientific method. The broad range of works selected challenges the traditional notion of the Romantic artist as a brooding genius given to introversion and fantasy. Augmented with select loans from private collections and Yale’s Lewis Walpole Library, the exhibition celebrates the richness and range of Romantic art at the university, representing it afresh for a new generation of museumgoers.

The Critique of Reason: Romantic Art, 1760–1860 has been co-organized by the Yale Center for British Art and the Yale University Art Gallery. The curators are, at the Center, A. Cassandra Albinson, Curator of Paintings and Sculpture, and Nina Amstutz, Postdoc-toral Research Associate, and, at the Gallery, Elisabeth (Lisa) Hodermarsky, Sutphin Family Senior Associate Curator of Prints and Drawings, and Paola D’Agostino, Nina and Lee Griggs Assistant Curator of European Art; and Izabel Gass, Graduate Research Assistant, at the Center and Gallery. The exhibition has been made possible by the Art Gallery Exhibition and Publication Fund, and the Robert Lehman, ba 1913, Endowment Fund, as well as by funds from the Yale Center for British Art Program Endowment.

EXHIBITION OPENING LECTURETHURSDAY, 5 MARCH, 5:30 PM

Song without Words: The Romanticism Experience

Joseph Leo Koerner, Director of Undergraduate Studies, Victor S. Thomas Professor of the History of Art and Architecture, Harvard University

Romanticism is perhaps best defined by its refusing definition. Intensifying the subjective nature of human experience, Romantic artists reached toward willfully indeterminate goals. They launched their work as songs without words, that is, as open-ended expressions that each individual viewer creatively completes. Joseph Leo Koerner puts words to some of the pictures in the exhibition The Critique of Reason: Romantic Art, 1760–1860. Reception to follow.

This program will be held in the Robert L. McNeil Jr. Lecture Hall, Yale University Art Gallery, 1111 Chapel Street. It is generously sponsored by the Martin A. Ryerson Lectureship Fund.

PAUL MELLON LECTURES

Sculpture on the Threshold: An Inquiry into the Underlying Forms of Sculpture

Penelope Curtis, Director, Tate Britain

The Paul Mellon Lectures are given biennially by an invited specialist in British art, first at the National Gallery, London, with the support of the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, and again at the Yale Center for British Art. The series of five lectures will be given at the National Gallery in London on 19 and 26 January, and 2, 9, and 16 February; and at Yale University on 16, 21, 23, 28, and 30 April.

Curtis’s lectures take a wide-ranging look at the underlying forms of sculpture. Focusing on four key aspects—the vertical, the hori-zontal, the closed, and the open—the lectures explore sculptural forms across time and suggest fundamental continuities. Taking examples from the early medieval to the present, and looking at utilitarian as well as idealizing formulae, the series suggests that we bring a deep subliminal understanding to our experience of sculpture, and that sculpture occupies a position on the physical and conceptual threshold of our familiar world.

As of January, the Yale Center for British Art is closed to the public for thirteen months while it implements the second phase of its interior conservation project. Both the public galleries and the Lecture Hall will be refurbished, and the Center’s infrastructure will be significantly upgraded. The project is guided by more than a decade of study that resulted in the

publication, in 2011, of a conservation plan dedicated to preserving and maintaining the Center’s landmark building designed by Louis I. Kahn (1901–1974).

For updates on the project throughout the year, visit britishart.yale.edu/bcp.

YCBA BUILDING CONSERVATION PROJECT

above: J. M. W. Turner, Fluelen: Morning (Looking towards the Lake), 1845, watercolour, gouache, and scratching out on medium, slightly textured, cream wove paper, Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection. below: Photo by Richard Caspole

newsletter - issue 41

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