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Snowflakes: Wilson Bentley’s Civil War

Wilson A. Bentley, Snowflakes Photomicrographed, c. 1890. Albumen prints. Smithsonian Archives, History Division, Washington, D.C. Published in Wilson A. Bentley and William J. Humphreys, Snow Crystals (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1931).

Lecture Leventritt Lecture

Harvard Art Museums
32 Quincy Street, Cambridge, MA

Vermont photographer Wilson Alwyn Bentley (1865–1931), known as “Snowflake” Bentley, spent a lifetime photographing snowflakes, eventually collecting thousands of images published at the end of his life in a book called Snow Crystals. In this lecture, Alexander Nemerov, chair of the Department of Art and Art History at Stanford University, will consider the relation of Wilson’s photographs to the war that ended the year he was born.

This lecture is presented in conjunction with Winslow Homer: Eyewitness, on view at the Harvard Art Museums from August 31, 2019 through January 5, 2020.

The lecture will take place in Menschel Hall, Lower Level. Please enter the museums via the entrance on Broadway. Doors will open at 5:30pm.

Free admission, but seating is limited. Tickets will be distributed beginning at 5:30pm at the Broadway entrance. One ticket per person.

Following the lecture, guests are invited to visit the Winslow Homer: Eyewitness exhibition on Level 3 until 8pm.

Complimentary parking available in the Broadway Garage, 7 Felton Street, Cambridge.

Support for the lecture is provided by the M. Victor Leventritt Fund, which was established through the generosity of the wife, children, and friends of the late M. Victor Leventritt, Harvard Class of 1935. The purpose of the fund is to present outstanding scholars of the history and theory of art to the Harvard and Greater Boston communities. Support for the Winslow Homer exhibition was provided by the Bolton Fund for American Art, Gift of the Payne Fund; and the Henry Luce Foundation Fund for the American Art Department.