Letter from the Director, September 2026

While the weather outside continues to feel like full summer, the level of activity on Bowdoin’s Quad makes it clear that autumn, or at least our fall semester, is nearly here. Our new (and very large!) class of first year students has arrived, and continuing students are streaming back to campus every day. In the museum, we’re gearing up for a semester that will be packed with class visits, musical performances, speakers, and other events. Our summer exhibition, USA @ 250, will continue to be on view through much of the fall. We have a pair of exhibitions that are new to our galleries. The first of these opened at the very end of August. Titled Healing in Apartheid South Africa: Michael Goldblatt’s Photographs of the Alex Clinic, it was curated by a faculty member (David Gordon of the History Department) in collaboration with students in one of his classes and the BCMA’s Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, Anne Cross. The second new exhibition, which opens in early September, was drawn from our antiquities collection: What Did They Wear? The Art of Personal Adornment in the Ancient Mediterranean. We hope you will have the chance to visit the museum and to enjoy all of these in the days to come!

Stephen Perkinson
Professor of Art History and Interim Director, Bowdoin College Museum of Art

This letter from the director accompanied the Museum's September 2026 e-bulletin newsletter.