Sex Objects: Perspectives on Gender and Sexuality
Societies communicate their ideals about appropriate gender traits, relationships, and even daily choices regarding physical appearance through many means, including their art and material culture. These images and objects create an expectation that people will conform to society’s socially constructed gender roles even if it is not their natural inclination; however, marginalized groups may form and uphold other ideals of sexual and gendered expression. This exhibition was curated by 40 students in two university classes—anthropology and art history—each group exploring through their respective disciplines how visual and material culture illuminate theoretical models for socially constructed identities of “sex.”
On view through May 22, 2016 Location: Robert Hull Fleming Museum, University of Vermont, Burlington, VTFrench Speaking Culture in the Granite State
French speakers have been an integral part of New Hampshire’s state fabric since the nineteenth century. “French Speaking Culture in the Granite State” will honor Franco-American Thomas Plant, the original owner of the Lucknow estate, by explaining the history and impact of people with French or Francophone backgrounds in New Hampshire from the 19th century to today. Castle in the Clouds has partnered with the Franco American Center and Dr. Katherine Harrington of Plymouth State University in order to make this exhibit possible. This exhibit is free to the public.
On view May 7 - July 18, 2016 Location: Castle in the Clouds, Moultonborough, NH
People of the First Light
Reopening on the first of May with a new core exhibit, People of the First Light, the Abbe Museum introduces visitors to the Wabanaki universe, engaging them with the culture and history of a people that is unfamiliar to many. Bringing together oral traditions, personal stories, cultural knowledge, language, and historical accounts with objects, photographs, multi-media, and digital interactives, People of the First Light shares a wide variety of content and perspectives around more than 12,000 years of history, conflict, adaptation, and survival in the Wabanaki homeland.
On view starting May 1, 2016 Location: Abbe Museum, Bar Harbor, ME
Art in Focus: Relics of Old London
After being closed for more than a year the Yale Center for British Art will be reopening this Spring 2016. When the Center reopens, visitors can explore Art in Focus: Relics of Old London an exhibition of carbon photoprints commissioned between 1875 and 1886 by the short-lived Society for Photographing the Relics of Old London. Art In Focus is an annual initiative giving students curators the opportunity to select objects for exhibition, write text panels and object labels, and make decisions about installation under the mentorship of Center curators and staff.
On view through August 14, 2016 Location: The Yale Center for British Art, Yale University, New Haven, CT
Coast Guard Art Exhibit
The Coast Guard Art Program (COGAP) which celebrates its 35th anniversary this year, communicates the Coast Guard's important mission to diverse audiences through fine arts. Twenty-one works by 17 artists of the U.S. Coast Guard Art Program will be exhibited at the Hull Lifesaving Museum. Paintings include modern-day Coast Guard missions as well as major events in the service's 226 year-long history. COGAP art provides visual testimony to the unique contribution the Coast Guard makes to the nation in its multifaceted role as a military, humanitarian and law enforcement organization.
On view through May 31, 2016 Location: Hull Lifesaving Museum, Hull, MA
Photo-Secession: Painterly Masterworks of Turn-of-the-Century Photography
In 1902, a group of visionary photographers broke with convention and began exploring new techniques that would ultimately push the boundaries of the art form. This revolutionary approach, called Pictorialism, involved the manipulation of negatives and prints to create images that approximated the effects of drawings, etchings, and oil paintings. Inspired by earlier such movements like Britain’s Linked Ring, this intrepid group began referring to their effort collectively as “the Photo-Secession,” and started a campaign to establish photography as a full-fledged fine art, equal with painting, sculpture, and etching. The exhibit features works by the preeminent artist-photographers of the day, including the group’s leader, Alfred Stieglitz, who founded the “Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession” to provide members with a venue for exhibiting their work.
On view from April 12 to August, 28, 2016 Location: Springfield Museums, MA