January
Screenprint of a blurred face on a malfunctioning television screen.
Ring in the new year by viewing a fresh round of exhibitions at the Harvard Art Museums, from a display of works by Fluxus artists to an installation of Picasso’s prints and drawings. Opening on Saturday, January 20, Wolf Vostell: Dé-coll/age Is Your Life features the work of German artist Wolf Vostell, who created art that challenged human complacency toward war, genocide, and other catastrophic world events. Picasso: War, Combat, and Revolution, opening the same day, presents a selection of Picasso’s prints and drawings related to the themes surrounding his pivotal painting Guernica.

Be sure to catch the remaining days of the thought-provoking exhibition Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade, on view until Sunday, January 14. On the horizon, keep an eye out on our site for details about two spring exhibitions: LaToya M. Hobbs: It’s Time and Future Minded: New Works in the Collection, both opening March1.

Also, check the calendar for special closing dates later this month.
A print showing two red opium poppy plants and their roots, with their Latin names below.

EXHIBITION

Before It’s Gone

Plan your visit this month to experience Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade before it closes on January 14. Explore the entwined histories of the opium trade and the Chinese art market between the late 18th and early 20th centuries.
Screenprint of a blurred face on a malfunctioning television screen.

Fluxus artist Wolf Vostell appropriated the term décollage (to unglue or to take off) as a comprehensive concept for his art, emphasizing destruction as a creative process. The exhibition Wolf Vostell: Dé-coll/age Is Your Life (January 20–May 5, 2024) presents Vostell’s works in multiple media, alongside works by his Fluxus collaborators and other peers. 
A black and white photograph of students sitting on the floor looking at an abstract painting.

An upcoming installation of drawings and prints by Picasso opens on Saturday, January 20, focusing on the core themes of his notable painting Guernica. It touches also on the repressive Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, broader imagery of death, struggles of good and evil, political and artistic revolution, and issues of desire and capture.

 
A bird’s-eye view of groups of people gathering in a courtyard surrounded by arches. Art is visible on the walls on the second and third floors.

Join us on Thursday, January 25 for Harvard Art Museums at Night and enjoy a warm evening with friends. Mingle in the Calderwood Courtyard with food and drinks, wander through over 50 galleries of art, and take part in a tour!
A hand holds an embroidery hoop attached to a blue garment; inside the hoop are embroidered pink and beige threads.

WORKSHOP

Visible Mending

Queer mender, natural dyer, and herbalist Maggie Ruth Haaland will lead an introductory workshop on Saturday, January 27 on darning and patching knitwear. Registration is required and space is limited; registration will open on this form, beginning on Wednesday, January 17.
Long brown pipe with decorated bowl at one end.

In this latest Index article, Nicole Ledoux, associate conservator of objects and sculpture, reveals new insights about the materials used in a Chinese opium pipe featured in Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade.

Index 

Events
 

WBUR is a media partner for our Harvard Art Museums at Night events.

Images: (header) Wolf Vostell, German, TV Blur, 1966. Screenprint on off-white wove paper. Harvard Art Museums/Busch-Reisinger Museum, Gift of The Wolf Vostell Estate, 2022.289. © Wolf Vostell/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn. Before It’s Gone: Basilius Besler, German, Papaver flore pleno rubrum, Papaver eraticum rubrum (plate 290), from Hortus Eystettensis, 1613 or 1713. Hand-colored print. Economic Botany Library of Oakes Ames, Harvard University, Julio Mario Santo Domingo Collection, TL42499.1. January At Night: Photo: Caitlin Cunningham Photography. Visible Mending: Photo: Maggie Ruth Haaland.
 
Support for Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade is provided by the Alexander S., Robert L., and Bruce A. Beal Exhibition Fund; the Robert H. Ellsworth Bequest to the Harvard Art Museums; the Harvard Art Museums’ Leopold (Harvard M.B.A. ’64) and Jane Swergold Asian Art Exhibitions and Publications Fund and an additional gift from Leopold and Jane Swergold; the José Soriano Fund; the Anthony and Celeste Meier Exhibitions Fund; the Gurel Student Exhibition Fund; the Asian Art Discretionary Fund; the Chinese Art Discretionary Fund; and the Rabb Family Exhibitions Fund. Related programming is supported by the M. Victor Leventritt Lecture Series Endowment Fund. Additional support for this project is provided by the Dunhuang Foundation.

Support for Wolf Vostell: Dé-coll/age Is Your Life is provided by the Ernst A. Teves Memorial Fund and the Care of the Busch-Reisinger Museum Collection Endowment. Related programming is supported by the M. Victor Leventritt Lecture Series Endowment Fund. In addition, modern and contemporary art programs at the Harvard Art Museums are made possible in part by generous support from the Emily Rauh Pulitzer and Joseph Pulitzer, Jr., Fund for Modern and Contemporary Art.






This email was sent to newsletter@newslettercollector.com
why did I get this?    unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences
Harvard Art Museums · 32 Quincy Street · Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 · USA