On the Road: BCMA Collection Highlights Currently on Tour

While we always enjoy a bustling cycle of exhibitions and programs here at the BCMA, audiences may wonder what happens behind the scenes to works of art not currently on display. In addition to being actively used in teaching and research, our collection objects also travel near and far to partner institutions through loans and traveling exhibitions. Below are some highlights of works from the BCMA’s collection—both old favorites and new—that are currently on the road.

Opened earlier this spring at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York, the exhibition Death Is Not the End (March 17, 2023–January 14, 2024) explores different notions of death and the afterlife across mediums and traditions, from Tibetan Buddhism to Christianity. Included among the dynamic array of objects is our Memento Mori Prayer Bead, from the early 16th century by an unidentified German or Netherlandish artist. Carved from ivory, this small prayer bead originally decorated a chaplet or rosary and features vanitas motifs, such as head of a decaying corpse and various vermin, that serve to remind the devotee of their own mortality. Previously, the subject of death and the macabre was the focus of the BCMA’s 2017 exhibition, The Ivory Mirror: The Art of Mortality in Renaissance Europe.

We are thrilled to see Geo Neptune’s 2018 basket, Apikcilu Binds the Sun, a recent acquisition by the Museum, included in the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s 2023 Renwick Invitational. Entitled Sharing Honors and Burdens (May 26, 2023–March 31, 2024), it marks the first time that the Renwick Invitational features exclusively Native American and Alaskan Native makers. As one of six artists selected, Neptune is highlighted for their basketry that combines technical mastery, Wabanaki traditions, and contemporary storytelling. In Apikcilu Binds the Sun, Neptune weaves the tale of the Wabanaki hero Koluskap, the striped skunk (Apikcilu), and the Sun Bird (Kisuhs) through a delicate blend of ash and sweetgrass. The basket’s gradient of rich violets, blues, pinks, and gold evoke the imagery of sunrise and sunset. Neptune previously visited campus in conjunction with the exhibition Innovation and Resilience Across Three Generations of Wabanaki Basket-Making, curated by leaders of the Native American Students Association in 2022.

If you happen to be near the New Haven area, don’t miss the latest installation at the Yale University Art Gallery, Mickalene Thomas/Portrait of an Unlikely Space (September 8, 2023–January 7, 2024). As a collaboration between the Gallery and the artist, it blends a selection of early American portraits of Black women, men, and children with contemporary artworks and tableaux installations by Thomas and others. The historical pieces focused specifically on small-scale portraits from the pre-Emancipation period, such as antebellum miniatures, daguerreotypes, silhouettes, and engravings, including a gem from the BCMA’s collection: Portrait of an Unidentified Man. A rare example of a portrait miniature that depicts a Black sitter from the early 19th century, this unknown gentleman’s fashion and appearance raise many questions about his identity and the circumstances of this image’s production. Situated in a homelike environment, this miniature and other works evoke the sense of intimacy, domesticity, and the ghostly presence of stories lost.   

Another exhibition that opens later this November at the American Folk Art Museum in New York, which will travel to Historic Deerfield next spring, is Unnamed Figures: Black Presence and Absence in the Early American North (November 15, 2023–March 24, 2024). This exhibition focuses on the representations of Black figures in New England and the Mid-Atlantic from the late 17th century through the early 19th century, revealing and complicating histories of Black people in the North. It will bring together approximately 125 works from paintings,  portraits, needlework, photographs, and other vernacular forms, including the BCMA’s Portrait of a Man (Abner Coker) by Joshua Johnson. A rare example of an early portrait of a Black sitter by an African American artist, the painting emphasizes the subject’s sobriety and dignity through Johnson’s naturalistic style. Coker served as a Reverend at Baltimore’s Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, enriching our understanding of Black lives and agency which the exhibition aims to underscore.  

Looking closer to home, the Museum is delighted to support our colleagues at the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine, for their upcoming exhibition Marsden Hartley and the Sea (October 6, 2023–October 7, 2024). Inspired by the painter’s time in Nova Scotia and Vinalhaven during the late 1930s, this exhibition highlights artistic connections to the fishing industry, maritime life, and the rich iconography of coastal Maine. For this occasion, the BCMA is happy to have its painting  After the Storm, Vinalhaven included. This picture captures the elemental strengths of nature through Hartley’s simple yet forceful rendering of the rocky shores, whipping waves, and stormy clouds.

We hope you enjoyed learning about this selection of BCMA objects currently on the road. Stay tuned for future installments to learn what else lays in store for works of art you know and love!

Sabrina Lin
Curatorial Assistant and Manager of Student Programs

 

images:

Apikcilu Binds the Sun, 2018, ash, sweetgrass, commercial dyes, acrylic ink, 24k gold-plated beads by Geo Soctomah Neptune (Niskapisuwin). Bowdoin College Museum of Art Museum Purchase, The Philip Conway Beam Endowment Fund.

Portrait of a Gentleman, ca. 1820, watercolor on ivory mounted in gold case, by an unidentified artist. Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Museum Purchase, Art Purchase Fund.

Portrait of a Man (Abner Coker), ca. 1805-1810, oil on canvas, by Joshua Johnson. Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Museum Purchase, George Otis Hamlin Fund.

After the Storm, Vinalhaven, 1938-1939, oil on Academy board by Marsden Hartley.  Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Charles Phillip Kuntz.