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This survey features a selection of over 600 objects drawn from the collections of the Fogg, Busch-Reisinger, and Arthur M. Sackler museums that reflects the diversity and richness of the Harvard Art Museums' holdings. Well-known objects are included alongside rarely displayed works in thematic gallery spaces: the first floor features European and American art since 1900, Islamic and Asian art is on the second floor, and Western art from antiquity to the turn of the last century on the fourth floor. Re-View represents a powerful distillation of the collection, balancing a wish to make available major works, familiar works, and works integral to the Art Museums' core mission of teaching and research.

Re-View is on long-term display at the Arthur M. Sackler Museum while the Art Museums' building at 32 Quincy Street — the former home of the Fogg and Busch-Reisinger — is closed for renovation. This major renovation and expansion project, designed by architect Renzo Piano, with completion anticipated in 2013, will unite the three museums in a single state-of-the-art facility.

Re-View has been made possible by a generous grant from the NBT Charitable Trust, as well as the Art Museums’ Alexander S., Robert L., and Bruce A. Beal Exhibition Fund; Anthony and Celeste Meier Exhibitions Fund; and Charlotte F. and Irving W. Rabb Exhibition Fund.

Temporary Installations

A limited number of objects in Re-View are rotated periodically. In the Islamic and Later Indian gallery, second floor, thematic installations highlight paintings, drawings, calligraphy, and photographs. Two niches on the fourth floor feature works on paper, recent acquisitions, and installations tied to university courses.

Rubens and the Baroque Festival
March 19–August 28, 2010
Floor 4
Rubens’s oil on wood sketch of Neptune Calming the Tempest in the Fogg collection is a preparatory study for the left wing of the Stage of Welcome, a temporary stage built in honor of the triumphal entry of the new Spanish governor, the Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand, into Antwerp in 1635. This small installation juxtaposes the sketch with an engraving of the final stage and with Renaissance prints and ancient coins and cameos that informed Rubens’s design. Organized by Anna Knaap, Theodore Rousseau Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Paintings, Sculpture and Decorative Arts, Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, in collaboration with Carmen Arnold-Biucchi, Damarete Curator of Ancient Coins, Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, and lecturer on classics, Harvard University.

Related Event: Art, Music, and Spectacle in the Age of Rubens. Two-day symposium, April 16-17.
Related Event: Theatricality in Rubens’s Triumphal Entry of 1635. Gallery talk, April 28.
Related Event: Anversa e Genova: Rubens's Genoese Connection. Gallery talk, June 26.

Around Antique: Prints, Drawings, and Photographs
May 14–September 4, 2010
Floor 4
Highlighting the strengths of the Harvard Art Museums′ collections of works on paper, this installation explores objects associated with the antique, including drawings after classical sculptures, photographs of temple ruins, and prints of mythological figures such as Hercules and Bacchus. These objects complement displays in the adjacent gallery, part of the ongoing exhibition Re-View, which address more broadly the Western tradition of themes and styles derived from Greek, Roman, and Egyptian antiquity. Organized by Emily Hankle, Cunningham Curatorial Assistant for Prints; Michelle Lamunière, John R. and Barbara Robinson Family Assistant Curator of Photography; and Miriam Stewart, assistant curator of drawings.

Related Event: Around Antique: Works on Paper. Gallery talk, August 14.

Peter Blume, Passage to Aetna
June 4–September 4, 2010
Floor 4
This small installation focuses on Peter Blume’s striking painting Passage to Aetna (1956). The Harvard Art Museums own over fifty preparatory drawings for this canvas; seven of them are also on display. Throughout his life Peter Blume produced visually arresting paintings that often treated the theme of decay and rebirth. Passage to Aetna is his response to what he called the “various layers of civilization” that he found in obscure corners of Sicily. In the painting, the legendary volcano Mount Aetna is suggested, but not seen. It is invoked in the tumbled columns in the foreground, which rise from a subterranean stream that flows from the depths of the volcano; the pitched roofs and receding laundry; and the smoking chimney. Blume evokes the stratified proximity of past and present: skeletons from the catacombs juxtaposed with living figures and their vital, fluttering clothing, and ruined fragments supporting genial houses brimming with activity. Organized by Miriam Stewart, assistant curator of drawings, Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum.

Heroic Gestes: Epic Tales from Firdawsi’s Shahnama
June 18–November 27, 2010
Floor 2
Featuring the gestes, or deeds, of great heroes and kings, the Shahnama is the most important work of epic poetry in the Persian language. As it chronicles the reigns of 50 monarchs, Firdawsi’s text is interwoven with a cycle of heroic tales. Rich in action, pathos, and horror, these tales have inspired many of the greatest paintings in the history of Islamic manuscript illustration. The nine works of art in this installation explore major themes in the text: the struggle between Iran and Turan; the element of fantasy in many of the tales; and Firdawsi’s dark view of fate. Curated by Mary McWilliams, Norma Jean Calderwood Curator of Islamic and Later Indian Art, Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum; and Sunil Sharma, assistant professor of Persianate and comparative literature, Boston University.

The installation is made possible by funding from the Arthur Urbane Dilley and Theron Johnson Damon Fund for Islamic Art and Culture.

Two complementary Boston-area exhibitions also celebrating the millennium of Firdawsi’s Shahnama are on display at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (April 24, 2010–January 16, 2011) and the Houghton Library, Harvard University (July 6–November 24, 2010).

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