Current and upcoming exhibitions, events
and professional opportunities
A selection of decorative arts activities not covered in the DAS Newsletter
For DAS events, go to: https://www.decartssociety.org/upcoming-programs.
Events
62nd Annual Seminar on Glass
Corning Museum of Glass
Corning, NY
www.cmog.org
October 22–23, 2024 (online)
This year’s seminar brings together scholars, artists and perfumers to consider the relationship between glass and scent throughout history. The seminar complements the CMOG exhibition Sensorium: Stories of Glass and Fragrance.
The program includes a keynote presentation about 20th-century perfume bottles; papers about subjects as diverse as the trade of balsam in the ancient world, the evolution of Islamic rosewater sprinklers and the modern perfume bottles created by René Lalique; and moderated panels about how to integrate fragrance into museum exhibitions. Contemporary glassmakers offer new perspectives on olfactory art.
Speakers are from around the world. Highlights include:
“Glass and Fragrance in the Ancient Mediterranean and Islamic Worlds,” Katherine Larson, curator of ancient glass, and manager, curatorial affairs, CMOG (USA)
“From the Glass Workshop to the sūq al-cattārīn: A Small Container’s Journey,” Stefano Carboni, former CEO, Museums Commission, Ministry of Culture of Saudi Arabia (Australia)
“A Flask of Scented Oil: Perfume and Glass Development in Ancient Jewish Culture,” Deborah Green, Greenberg Associate Professor of Hebrew Language and Literature, University of Oregon (USA)
“Twin Flames: Vessel and Fragrance Development in the Ancient Near East,” Nuri McBride, owner, Atropos Parfums & Consultancy (Israel)
“Curating Scent in the Museum,” host and moderator: Troy Smythe, manager, interpretation strategy and education projects, CMOG
“Incorporating Fragrance in the Art Museum: Two Case Studies,” Lizzie Marx, curator of Dutch and Flemish art, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin (Ireland)
“Beyond the Bottle,” Dana El Masri, owner, Jazmin Saraï (USA)
“Smelling Objects in the Museum: Art, Design and Perfume,” Clara Muller, independent curator (France)
and more
For the full program, go to https://whatson.cmog.org/events-programs/lectures-seminars/annual-seminar-glass#.
The seminar is free, but registration is required. For registration information, go to https://whatson.cmog.org/events-programs/lectures-seminars/annual-seminar-glass/registration.
Colloquium: Reawakening Materials: American Art, Empire and Material Histories in Historic Deerfield’s Collection
Historic Deerfield
Deerfield, MA
November 7–8, 2024
Reawakening Materials: American Art, Empire and Material Histories in Historic Deerfield’s Collection is a public colloquium centered on the Historic Deerfield (HD) collection of paintings, works on paper and decorative arts.
Questions of “empire” emerged from rethinking the American experience from the lens of global European empires (England, Spain, France, the Netherlands, etc.) and U.S. imperialism. The HD collection focuses on 18th- and 19th-century American art and material culture, and is tied to Indigenous communities, histories of enslaved and free people of African descent, and settler colonialism.
The colloquium explores relationships between empire and the materials of artworks in the HD collection. The program engages with interpretations of settler colonialism and asks how objects with their material histories broaden understandings of American empire. It also provides methods for telling these narratives and interpretive strategies through historic interiors, generating knowledge and new frameworks that can speak to the complexity of American art.
Invited scholars in historical American art, African American and diasporic studies, Native American studies, conservation, and allied fields at the colloquium investigate materials that reveal new ideas of empire, including lacquer, birch, linen and more, and discuss material often neglected or forgotten in narratives of American art to uncover new ways to reveal ideas of empire.
Highlights include:
• Opening reception with keynote by Dr. Charmaine Nelson, provost professor, Black diasporic art & visual culture, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
• “Sally George’s Pequot Healing Ministry, Horatio A. Hamilton’s Medicine Chest and the Ambulatory Alchemy of Healing Power in the Native Northeast/New England Borderlands,” Anthony Trujillo (Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo), PhD candidate in American studies, Harvard University
“Natural Materials,” Dr. Mary Amanda McNeil, assistant professor, Department of Studies in Race, Colonialism and Diaspora, Tufts University
• Tour of historic houses and other properties
• “Sylvan Nationalism: The Birch Example,” Joseph Litts, PhD candidate in art history, Princeton University
• “‘Conquer difficulties’: Investigating Eliza Clarkson’s Chinese Lacquer,” Lan Morgan, associate curator, Peabody Essex Museum
• “Threads of Power: Needlework, Enslavement and the Fabrication of Washington’s Legacy,” Jonathan Square, assistant professor of Black visual culture, Parsons School of Design
The full schedule is at:
To attend in person, go to:
To attend via Zoom, go to:
Symposium on Historical Dress: Collections, Collectors and Collaborations Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
Williamsburg, VA
www.colonialwilliamsburg.org
November 14–16, 2024
This symposium celebrates the opening of the Mary Turner Gilliland and Clinton R. Gilliland Gallery at the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg (VA), as well as 90 years of historical dress and costumed interpretation at Colonial Williamsburg; 70 years of the Margaret Hunter Shop; the first curated exhibition of clothing and accessories at Colonial Williamsburg ( 1954); and 40 years of mantua-making in Colonial Williamsburg’s department of historic trades.
For registration, go to: https://web.cvent.com/event/68f772ab-9e1c-4f59-a784-eb17932e5081/summary?RefId=cwf.
Fait à Paris (Made in Paris) Conference
Kunstgewerbemuseum
Dresden, Germany
https://www.smb.museum/en/museums-institutions/kunstgewerbemuseum
November 17–19, 2024
This event is in conjunction with the exhibition of the same name, on display through February 2, 2025, which features the furniture work of Jean-Pierre Latz (1691–1754), who is considered as a leading cabinetmaker of his time.
Opportunities
Let the DAS know of employment openings, grants and related opportunities in the decorative arts. Send such information to newsletter@DecArtsSociety.org for publication here or in our newsletter, as appropriate.
Exhibitions
These events close between issues of the DAS newsletter and are listed by closing dates.
100 Years of Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House
Royal Collection Trust
London, England
www.rct.uk
Throughout 2024
Throughout 2024, the Royal Collection Trust celebrates the 100th anniversary of Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House at Windsor Castle.
The Dolls’ House was built between 1921 and 1924 as a gift from the nation to Queen Mary after the First World War. It went on display at Windsor Castle in 1925. The 1:12 scale replica of an Edwardian residence is complete with electricity, working elevators and running water. Rooms include a fully stocked wine cellar and “below-stairs” spaces, entertaining salons; objects include a tiny concert grand piano, fully strung and with functioning keys and miniature Crown Jewels inset with real diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds and seed pearls.
The kitchens and servants’ quarters feature a vacuum cleaner — a relatively new innovation in the 1920s; sewing machine with thread and minuscule scissors that can cut; and copper kettle made from a coin, with the king’s head still visible on its base.
Items were contributed by more than 1,500 artists, craftspeople and manufacturers of the day.
The room at Windsor Castle that was created for the Dolls’ House has also been re-presented to mark the anniversary. Designed by the house’s architect, Sir Edwin Lutyens, it features murals by the decorative landscape artist Philip Connard with the artists Dorothy Cohen and Winifred Hardman.
A new publication, The Miniature Library of Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House by Elizabeth Clark Ashby, explores the stories behind the creation of the Dolls’ House Library. The book includes a
foreword by the queen, as well as excerpts from selected works, some reproduced for the first time. Lucinda Lambton’s history of the Dolls’ House, first published in 2010, has been redesigned with newly photographed images.
Courses at the castle, in collaboration with the Royal School of Needlework, include a private tour of the Dolls’ House and hand-embroidery workshops inspired by the motifs on upholstery throughout the house. As Duchess of Cornwall, the queen became patron of the school in 2017.
To confirm whether exhibitions will be held as scheduled or for access to virtual versions, check the websites of museums and galleries before planning to visit in person.
Recent special invitations for DAS contributors
• In May 2023, DAS contributors were invited to an online presentation about Multiple Affinities: Art Botany in British Design Reform: 1835–1870 by Sarah Alford, assistant professor in craft history and theory at the Alberta University of the Arts (Canada). The program was presented by the Canadian Society of Decorative Arts/Cercle canadien des arts décoratifs (CSDA).
The program was part of the CSDA Sundays: The Expert Series — Multiple Affinities: Art Botany.
• In January 2023, DAS contributors received a special invitation to join The Antique in Print: The Classical Past and the Visual Arts in the Long 18th Century, a free online lecture hosted by the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum (New York, NY). Dr. Adriano Aymonino explored how the print culture of the “long 18th century” shaped the visual and allegorical language of Neoclassicism and placed Michel Angelo Pergolesi’s drawings and prints (Designs for Various Ornaments, 1777–1801) in context. Dr. Julia Siemon, curator of the Cooper Hewitt’s Mr. Pergolesi’s Curious Things: Ornament in 18th Century Britain, provided a brief overview of the exhibition.
• Contributors to the DAS were invited to explore the history and legacy of the Gorham Manufacturing Company by viewing the premiere of Chasing Silver: The Story of Gorham, a three-part documentary series from Rhode Island PBS Original (WSBE). The series aired in May 2021.
For more about the series, go to:
https://www.ripbs.org/blogs/bird-wire/chasing-silver-the-story-of-gorham/
Use this link for a live stream after each broadcast:
watch.ripbs.org/livestream or http://bit.ly/ChasingSilverVOD
• The DAS appreciates recent invitations from the UK Decorative Arts Society for our contributors to benefit from several online presentations:
√ Sarah Nichols presented “Glass: Venice, Venini and America.” She organized an exhibition about the relationship between Murano and America when she was chief curator and curator of decorative arts at the Carnegie Museum of Art (Pittsburgh, PA).
√ Matthew Winterbottom, curator of decorative arts and sculpture at the Ashmolean Museum (Oxford, UK), presented “The Colour Revolution: Art, Design, and Fashion in Victorian Britain.”
• Caitlin Condell, associate curator and head of the Department of Drawings, Prints and Graphic Design at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum (New York, NY), and DAS former Program chair Emily M. Orr, assistant curator of modern and contemporary American design at Cooper Hewitt, presented “Underground Modernist: E. McKnight Kauffer.”
Known as the “poster king,” Kauffer was a pioneer of commercial art who integrated avant-garde style into modern life. While living in England between the two World Wars, Kauffer produced radical posters; a wide range of book covers, rugs, theatrical productions; and more. He continued his work in New York from 1940 until his death in 1954. The lecture provided a behind-the-scenes look at a newly released monograph and forthcoming exhibition at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum surveying Kauffer’s work.
