Giovanni Battista Piranesi (Italian, 172-1778)
Arch of Septimus Severus from the series Vedute di Roma
Etching
Transfer from the Mount Holyoke College Library
Photo by Photo Laura Shea

Vedute di Roma (Views of Rome) explores the many views of Rome that appear in prints produced during the 16th-18th centuries. Artists such as Giovanni Battista Piranesi captured the shifting balance between the ancient and the modern that defined the Eternal City as it went through three centuries of change. Also on view is Giambattista Nolli's monumental 1748 map of Rome that masterfully captures the culmination of these changes.

Dr. Dorie Reents-Budet

Lecture by Dorie Reents-Budet, PhD
Curator, Art of the Ancient Americas, Museum of Fine Art, Boston

In conjunction with the special exhibition, Transported and Translated: Arts of the Ancient Americas

Mexican, Nayarit
Female Figure
Burnished red ceramic with polychrome pigments, ca. 250 BCE-250 CE
Gift of Estelled Jussim and Elizabeth Lindquist-Cook (Class of 1947)
Photo by Petegorsky/Gipe

Brilliantly-painted Nasca pots, rich Chimu blackware, and animated West Mexican figurines are among the captivating objects on display in Mount Holyoke College Art Museum's, Transported and Translated: Arts of the Ancient Americas. The selection of intriguing vessels and sculptures brings to light a lesser-known strength within the Museum’s collection, and is, in many ways, the result of an “excavation” among its own holdings. Transported and Translated introduces visitors to the visually rich cultures that occupied Mesoamerica and the Andean region of South America from roughly 300 BCE to the time of the Spanish Conquest in the early 16th century.

Talk by Fritz Allhoff, Professor of philosophy at Western Michigan University, at the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum.

Isoda Koryūsai (Japanese, active 1766-1788)
A Party in the Yoshiwara from the series Shikidô tokkumi jûni-tsugai (Twelve Bouts of Lovemaking)
Woodcut, 1775
Gift of Mrs. Louis C. Black

From the tilling of the soil to the washing of the dishes, nearly every step in food's journey from production to consumption has been represented in the visual arts. Whether planted or hunted, cooked or purchased, eaten as basic sustenance or in celebration, food has worked its way into numerous prints, drawings, and photographs, as the focus of a composition or as an accessory. While still lifes featuring comestibles hold a prominent place in the history of art, artists have created food-related images in a broad diversity of styles, each presenting unique cultural concerns and associations. In the production of food, depictions of the farmer in fine art range from nostalgic to downtrodden, and have occasionally been elevated to political icon. Those who cook or prepare food experience no less iconographic manipulation in the hands of the artist, with gender roles also apparent. In its consumption, food is critical to both social interactions and religious practices. While specific rituals vary widely, as can be seen in images that range from an 18th-century Japanese woodcut illustrating the offering of sake to a courtesan to a 19th-century depiction of the Last Supper, food fuels not only the human body but also the relationships, religions, economies and other social structures that dictate our lives. From Seed to Supper is one of two Mount Holyoke College Art Museum exhibitions that are part of the Museums 10 collaboration, Table for 10.

Theodor Rombouts (Flemish, 1597-1637)
A Drinker with a Flask
Oil on canvas
Whitfield Fine Art, London

Wine has been instrumental in nurturing the human spirit since ancient times. No beverage or potion has a longer history than wine, whose transformative effects on both body and spirit were recognized from its beginnings in the Neolithic age. But until now, no serious art exhibition has coupled the histories of wine and art in a cross-disciplinary fashion. In September 2010, the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum in South Hadley, Massachusetts will open Wine and Spirit: Rituals, Remedies, and Revelry, focusing on the imagery of sacred, social, and restorative practices that have occasioned wine’s singular mystique in civilizations across nearly every age. More than 100 works of art and literature will be on view—the earliest a rare Neolithic wine jar from Hajji Firuz Tepe dating from 5400-5000 BCE. Seventeenth-century Dutch paintings by Pieter Claez. And Jan Steen will be featured alongside prints, drawings, and photographs by Honoré Daumier, Pablo Picasso, Jacob Jordaens, Roger Fenton, and others. Greek vases, Roman glassware, Renaissance drinking vessels, and medieval manuscripts are among the objects also included. The medicinal aspects of wine are revealed in a display of Italian Renaissance apothecary jars, early printed treatises, herbal books, and pharmacopiae that attest to the beverage’s purported benefits from antiquity to the present day. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Walters Art Gallery, the Wadsworth Atheneum, Yale University Art Gallery, the Corning Museum of Glass, and the Houghton Library at Harvard University are among the nearly two dozen lenders to the exhibition.

Sunday, May 2, 3-5 p.m.

Early 15th-Century Italian music,Gionvanni Perluigi daPalestrina, and Justin Morgan with voices, Renaissance winds and strings Conducted by Robert Eisenstein Director Five College Early Music Program John and Norah Warbeke Gallery Mount Holyoke College Art Museum South Hadley, Massachusetts

Lecture by Tim Eriksen, Musician and Ethnomusicologist with local shape note singers John and Norah Warbeke Gallery Mount Holyoke College Art Museum South Hadley, Massachusetts

Wendy Watson

Lecture by Wendy Watson, Curator, Mount Holyoke College Art Museum

Lippo d'Andrea (Italian, ca. 1370/71-1451)
Virgin and Child Enthroned with Saints John the Baptist and Nicholas of Bari (detail)

Tempera and gold on panel, ca. 1410
Middlebury College Museum of Art (2005.056)
Photo by Photograph Tad Merrick, Vermont

Lecture by Laurence Kanter, Lionel Goldfrank III Curator of European Art
Yale University Art Gallery Reception to follow Gamble Auditorium Mount Holyoke College Art Museum South Hadley, Massachusetts

Katherine Smith Abbott

Lecture by Katherine Smith Abbott, Visting Professor Department of Art and Architecture Middlebury College Reception to follow Gamble Auditorium Mount Holyoke College Art Museum South Hadley, Massachusetts

Sano di Pietro (Italian, 1405-1481
Virgin and Child
Tempera and gold on panel, ca. 1465-1475
Bequest of Caroline R. Hill

At heart a collaborative venture,

the creation of early fifteenth-century panel paintings in Italy depended upon a tight network of connections between patrons, painters, woodworkers, and gilders. The product of these interactions was an object that served both as a focus for devotion, and as an emphatic statement about wealth and status. Shown at Middlebury College in the fall of 2009, The Art of Devotion: Panel Painting in Early Renaissance Italy, is a collaborative exhibition that includes six works from the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum and 14 significant works from ten national and international collections. A display of the materials and techniques employed by the artists and included in the exhibition demonstrates how these objects were made and adds to our understanding of those who produced and owned them. Featuring artists such as Giovanni del Biondo, Giovanni dal Ponte, Gentile da Fabriano, and Lippo d’Andrea, the exhibit explores the ways in which these works—often described as “conservative”, or “late Gothic,” offer a more authentic view of the early Renaissance, one that balances our notion of a time and place usually characterized solely by departures from tradition.

Indian, from Madhya Pradesh
Dancing Ganesha
Sandstone, 800-900 CE
Purchase with the Belle and Hy Baier Art Acquisition Fund

This companion exhibition to The Art of Devotion: Panel Painting in Early Renaissance Italy explores devotional traditions manifest in visual art from a diverse array of cultures and time periods. Reflecting both the thoughtful interpretations and scholarly expertise of contributing faculty, students, staff,and other friends of the Museum, the accompanying texts and brochure seek to provide insight into why these objects have inspired humans of every tradition, enhancing their faith and connecting them to a higher purpose.