Calendar of Events

Listen to an informal musical performance in Avery Court by the Hartford-area Oboe Duo Agosto: oboist Ling-Fei Kang and oboist/English hornist Charles Huang. Free with museum admission. 

Listen to an informal musical performance by members of the Hartford-area Azul String Quartet, cellist Pablo Issa and violist Eugenio Figueroa, while you explore the works on view in Morgan Great Hall. Free with museum admission.

Robert Wiesenberger, curator of contemporary projects at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Mass., responds to Matt Paweski / MATRIX 191, drawing on his own critical and curatorial interest in the intersection of modern and contemporary art, design, and architecture. Wiesenberger discusses how Paweski’s sculptural work both aligns and breaks with tradition, and makes connections with the Wadsworth’s collection, buildings, and histories. Free with museum admission. Meet in front of the Museum Shop.

Artists in New England have fashioned hooked rugs since the early nineteenth century in a tradition that continues to thrive and develop. Drop in and visit with Michele Micarelli, an internationally recognized rug-hooking artist based in New Haven, Conn., as she demonstrates the process of transforming hand-dyed wool and fabric scraps into elaborate hooked rugs. Free with admission.

Presented in conjunction with Alexander Calder: Collaborative Creations.

Entwyned Early Music Ensemble returns to the Wadsworth for an informal program of seventeenth-century music from the Dutch Republic. Enjoy the works on view in Chasing Rembrandt and the nearby Dutch art galleries while listening to the sounds of Rembrandt’s time. Free with admission.

Presented with support from The Saunders Foundation Music Endowment at the Wadsworth Atheneum.

Taxile Maximin Doat (1851–1938) was one of the most important French ceramicists working at the turn of the twentieth century. Doat’s works are celebrated for his experimental glazes and technical achievements with pâte-sur-pâte (paste on paste) ornamentation. Linda Roth, curator of European decorative arts, explores the Wadsworth’s collection of ceramic works by Doat, including two recently acquired porcelain plates. Free with admission.

Taxile Doat, Plate, 1901. Porcelain. The European Decorative Arts Purchase Fund, 2019.16.2

Drop in for an informal performance by Chia-Yu Joy Lu, director of the Chinese music ensembles at Wesleyan University and Smith College, and Flora Gu, Wesleyan University student musician, featuring the erhu (Chinese two-string fiddle) and guzheng (Chinese 21-string zither). As you listen, view artworks from East Asia in the Wadsworth’s collection, including a porcelain “Vault of Heaven” vase dating to the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty. Free with admission.

Presented with support from The Saunders Foundation Music Endowment at the Wadsworth Atheneum.

”Vault of Heaven” vase (tianqiu ping), Qing Dynasty, Qianlong period (1736–95). Porcelain. Bequest of Elisha E. Hilliard, 1951.321

Fashion periodicals including Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar often highlighted the work of Alexander Calder (1898–1976) and his modernist contemporaries. The articles, which focused on all media as well as interior decorating that used Calder’s designs, were intended to educate women of fashion about current art and aesthetics for a well-rounded perspective beyond wearing stylish clothes. Collectively, they reveal that aspects of Calder’s work were marketed to broad audiences and fashion-savvy women to inform their artistic choices in home decoration and keep them informed about the art world. Join Ned Lazaro, the Wadsworth Atheneum’s associate curator of costumes and textiles, for a gallery talk about the intersection of Calder and fashion reporting in high fashion publications. Free with admission.

Salvator Rosa (1615–1673), one of the most eccentric painters of the Italian baroque, is celebrated for his unconventional approaches to portraiture, history painting, and landscape. Paintings conservator Allen Kosanovich examines an in-process treatment of Rosa’s Landscape with Tobias and the Angel (c. 1660), discussing how these efforts address over three centuries of aging and previous restoration. Free with admission.

Free to trade with the rest of the world after the American Revolution, citizens of the young United States found artistic inspiration at home and abroad. Explore the New Nation, Many Hands installation with Philippe Halbert, curator of American decorative arts, as he reveals how household goods, from ceramics and furniture to metalwork and textiles, combined practicality with patriotism in the early years of the United States. Free with admission. Meet in front of the Museum Shop. 

Image: Attributed to Abner Reed (American, 1771–1866), Sign for David Bissell’s Inn and Joseph Phelps’s Inn, 1777 and 1801, Paint on wood. Bequest of Emma Bell King, 1933.381