Curator Chat
What event (gallery show, museum exhibit, etc.) in the next few months are you looking forward to, and why?
I hope I have a chance to see Alexander Von Humboldt and the United States: Art, Nature,
and Culture at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. , this winter. Humboldt was an important figure in my doctoral dissertation, which investigated the way artists engaged with environmental conditions and change in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
What are you reading?
I recently received the catalog for the exhibition America’s Impressionism: Echoes of a Revolution, which will be traveling to the San Antonio Museum of Art, the Dixon Gallery and Gardens and the Brandywine River Museum in 2020 and 2021. I am always looking for new scholarship on American impressionism in order to help reinterpret the Michener’s collection. In my free time, I tend to read fiction. I just finished A Burning by Megha Majumdar.
Interesting exhibit, gallery opening or work of art you’ve seen recently.
It’s a challenging time to see artwork in person, and I missed it during the pandemic. One of the exhibitions I made a point to see soon after Philadelphia-area museums began to reopen is Marie Cuttoli: The Modern
Thread from Miró to Man Ray at the Barnes Foundation. Cuttoli revived the French tapestry industry by collaborating with modern artists to produce innovative designs. Albert Barnes was a fan and he helped bring Cuttoli and her tapestries to the U.S. during WWII.
What are you researching at the moment?
I am conducting research on the sculptor and studio craftsman Wharton Esherick for the Michener’s fall 2021 exhibition, Sculpture with a Purpose: Women, Patronage, and
Wharton Esherick, 1930-1945. This exhibition will explore the significant impact of three women—helene Fischer, Hanna Weil and Marjorie Content—on Esherick’s artistic development and career.
What is your dream exhibit to curate? Or see someone else curate?
I hope to one day curate a major, comprehensive exhibition of Pennsylvania Impressionism, exploring in depth the social, political and economic context of these early 20th-century painters that still loom large in the Bucks County artistic community.