Overview: Along with art and literature, the Renaissance brought a renewed interest in science as well. Unlike today when most museums are publicly accessible, each dedicated to a specific subject matter and designed to accommodate particular kinds of objects, collections in the Renaissance were private affairs, and many collectors combined painting and sculpture with natural history specimens to create a cabinet of curiosities. Through the combination of catalogs of these types of “cabinet” collections, botany and zoology surveys by famous polymaths like Athanasius Kircher, and other works that make use of natural history, this exhibition described some of the ways that art and science worked in tandem.

Organization: The exhibition was organized by the National Gallery of Art. Neal Turtell, executive librarian, was curator.