CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Among pop art’s notable motifs are capitalism, consumerism, and now Catholicism. Situated in the Harvard Art Museums’ new Special Exhibitions Gallery, Corita Kent and the Language of Pop, focuses on the work of a true Renaissance woman, who also became a nun at the age of 18 in Los Angeles. Kent practiced her faith at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Church and eventually studied and taught art at the college there. A simultaneously devoted artist, activist, and nun, the majority of the 60 screen printson display here are signed “Sister Mary Corita.” Organized in six parts, the show narrows in on a prolific five-year period from 1964 and 1969 wherein Kent created a large body of silkscreen work. The show aims to decipher Kent’s lesser-known work within the larger context of the Pop movement, but is there any room to add to the vocabulary of such a ubiquitously digested and understood movement as Pop?
Corita Kent’s Political and Holy Language in the Context of Pop
Today, archivists across the US took to Twitter to answer questions from the public. Like the recent #AskACurator Day, the #AskAnArchivist event allows experts from cultural institutions to share professional advice, rare stories or facts, and images of artifacts that might not be on display. No question is too silly or too practical, according to the Society of American Archivists, which organizes the event. The result has been a series of informative and hilarious insights into the roles of those charged with preserving our histories.
Eyewear for Chickens and a Time Capsule Full of Twinkies: Highlights from #AskAnArchivist Day
Cambridge, MA — There is a story that sometimes circulates through the art world claiming the reason some of Mark Rothko’s work has faded over time is because he bought his paint at Woolworth’s Department Store. The story, of course, is untrue. It is a rendering of old gossip repackaged and passed along as a fact despite ample evidence to the contrary. The truth, however, is both more mundane and more interesting. Notoriously secretive, some would say neurotic, about his studio habits, Rothko helped contribute to this mythology by actively blunting questions about how he worked, especially how he handled paint.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — On a warm day in June six years ago, the front doors of the Fogg Museum closed quietly. There was no banner reading “Closing Day” on Quincy Street at the edge of Harvard Yard, no ceremony, no press, no speech. At five o’clock, museum visitors shuffled out the exit in droves, toting travel books and the last discounted souvenirs.
(via A Pigment Library That Launched American Art Conservation)
When the Harvard Art Museums reopen this Sunday after a six-year expansion project, historic pigments foundational to the field of art conservation in the United States will be on public view. A new display will showcase the Forbes Pigment Collection as part of the Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies.