National Gallery of Art

From the Bulletin

CASVA's New Initiatives in African American Art: A Statement of Purpose (PDF 311KB)

African American art is a rich and complex field of representation that remains underrepresented and understudied, despite being essential to the comprehensive understanding of art history in the United States and beyond. In recent years the National Gallery of Art has endeavored to bring focus to this vital tradition through collecting, research, and programming across its various departments, including the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts. An article by Dean Elizabeth Cropper in the fall 2018 Bulletin outlines the framework and objectives of CASVA’s new initiatives in African American art. Over a five-year period, this series of initiatives in the Center’s programs of fellowships, meetings, research, and publications will evolve to establish a wide-ranging and enduring commitment to the advanced study of this dynamic field.

Recent Conference

Wyeth Conference in American Art
The American Still Life
October 19, 2018

Recent Lecture

Sydney J. Freedberg Lecture on Italian Art
Against Titian
Stephen J. Campbell, Johns Hopkins University
November 4, 2018

New Publication

Center 38: Record of Activities and Research Reports, June 2017–May 2018 (PDF 6.4MB)

This year the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts welcomed fellows from France, Italy, Japan, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The topics of their research ranged from the meanings of aesthetic production of the Nahua people of Central Mexico to artistic encounters with Byzantium during the expansion of Aragon, from Venice’s architectural program under Doge Leonardo Donà to the reemergence of narrative in 1970s performance art in the United States, and from the Italian architect Pirro Ligorio to a history of photography of the Swahili coast. Read more.

Announcing New Members

National Gallery of Art's Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts (CASVA) Announces 2018–2019 Academic Year Appointments

See the press release for more information.

New Audio and Video

The Sixty-Seventh A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts, 2018
Positive Barbarism: Brutal Aesthetics in the Postwar Period
Hal Foster, Princeton University
 
Watch / Listen

New Publication

The Artist in Edo
Studies in the History of Art, Volume 80
Edited by Yukio Lippit, 2018

A historic first showing outside Japan of the thirty-scroll series Colorful Realm of Living Beings (c. 1757–1766) at the National Gallery of Art was the occasion for this collection of twelve essays that reimagine the concepts of the artist and art-making as they were understood in early modern Japan. During the Edo period (1600–1868), peace and economic stability under the Tokugawa shogunate allowed both elite and popular arts and culture to flourish in Edo (Tokyo) and Kyoto. The essays consider a wide range of art forms—screen paintings, scrolls, prints, illustrated books, calligraphy, ceramics, textiles—giving extended attention to works by artists such as Ogata Kōrin, Nagasawa Rosetsu, Hon’ami Kōetsu, Tawaraya Sōtatsu, Katsushika Hokusai, and others, including Itō Jakuchū, creator of the spectacular depiction of nature in Colorful Realm. Published by the National Gallery of Art and distributed by Yale University Press.

Recent Symposium

Boundary Trouble: The Self-Taught Artist and American Avant-Gardes
February 16 – 17, 2018
East Building Auditorium
Program (PDF 428KB)

New Audio and Video

Wyeth Lecture in American Art
The Panorama and the Globe: Expanding the American Landscape in World War II
Cécile Whiting, University of California, Irvine

Watch / Listen

New Audio and Video Series

Reflections on the Collection: The Edmond J. Safra Visiting Professors at the National Gallery of Art

The Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts announces a new audio and video series, Reflections on the Collection: The Edmond J. Safra Visiting Professors at the National Gallery of Art. The four inaugural presentations include Edmond J. Safra Visiting Professors Kathleen A. Foster, Jacqueline Lichtenstein, Anna Ottani Cavina, and Carl Brandon Strehlke, who share their unique insights on works each selected from the National Gallery of Art collection. The presentations, ranging from five to 15 minutes in length, are a brief and special opportunity to take a closer look at important works inside gallery spaces with these distinguished professors.

New Endowment

$1 Million Received by the National Gallery of Art from the Edmond J. Safra Foundation to Endow the Edmond J. Safra Visiting Professorship at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts

The National Gallery of Art announced a $1 million grant from the Edmond J. Safra Foundation to support the Edmond J. Safra Visiting Professorship at CASVA. This generous gift coincides with the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's endowment challenge grant to the National Gallery of Art on the occasion of the Gallery's 75th anniversary. Matching funds will permit the professorship to be fully endowed. See the press release for more information.