From our friends at the National Gallery of Art...
This spring, the National Gallery of Art offers an array of public lectures featuring a distinguished group of artists, authors, curators, and scholars. Highlights include three public symposia, three book signings, the annual Elson Lecture, and the 63rd A.W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts.
On January 12, Gallery conservators and curators Daphne Barbour, Melanie Gifford, Lisha Glinsman, Alison Luchs, and Kimberly Schenk introduce Facture, the Gallery's new biennial journal featuring the latest in conservation research on works in the permanent collection. Named for "the manner in which all things are made," Facture addresses aspects of conservation from treatment and technical art history to scientific research.
Three symposia are presented this season. On February 28, Ways of Seeing Byzantium brings together noted scholars to explore themes of the exhibition Heaven and Earth: Art of Byzantium from Greek Collections (on view through March 2). On March 8, the Gallery hosts the Middle Atlantic Symposium in the History of Art, featuring recent scholarship by graduate students in art history. On March 22, El Greco: 400 Years After honors the 400th anniversary of the artist's death. Scholars will discuss El Greco's career, focusing on his early years in Greece and Italy, as well as his renowned work completed in the city of Toledo, Spain.
The Gallery celebrates African American History Month with three programs. On February 9, Ruth Fine discusses the collecting of African American art in a conversation with collector Rodney Merritt Miller. On February 23, a panel discussion between David Bindman, Ruth Fine, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Richard J. Powell, and Sharmila Sen, is moderated Faya Causey. A book signing of The Image of the Black in Western Art: The 20th Century: The Impact of Africa follows the lecture. Collector Kenneth Montague appears in conversation with curator Trevor Schoonmaker and collection manager Maria Kanellopoulos to discuss the Wedge Collection on March 9.
Following the release of the film The Monuments Men, Gallery staff and acclaimed author Lynn H. Nicholas present the lecture program The Inside Story: Monuments Men and the National Gallery of Art on March 16. Maygene Daniels, Gregory Most, and Nicholas (author of The Rape of Europa: The Fate of Europe's Treasures in the Third Reich and the Second World War) reveal the Gallery's role with the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program and the Roberts Commission, in a program moderated by Faya Causey.
On March 27, Allan McCollum will deliver the 2014 Elson Lecture, part of a series of annual lectures featuring distinguished contemporary artists whose work is represented in the Gallery's permanent collection.
Beginning on March 30, the Gallery's acclaimed A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts returns for the 63rd year with Anthony Grafton, whose six-part lecture series is titled Past Belief: Visions of Early Christianity in Renaissance and Reformation Europe.
All lecture programs are presented free of charge and take place in the East Building Auditorium unless otherwise noted. Seating is on a first-come, first-seated basis. Programs may move to other locations as the East Building undergoes renovations; for the latest information, check www.nga.gov/programs/lectures.
