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MHCAM Blog

Welcome to mhcameo, the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum blog. Here we post about unique happenings, including behind-the-scenes looks at our exhibitions, close examinations of objects from the collection, and art-related chats with alumnae, faculty, and students. Sign-up below for blog alerts and take a regular peek at mhcameo!

  • Lucy M. Lewis, Jar (olla), ca. 1953
    Uncategorized

    An Affinity for Southwestern Pottery

    Associate Curator of Visual and Material Culture Aaron Miller interviews Juli Shea Towell ’55 about her amazing collection of artworks from the Pueblo communities of the American Southwest. Towell recently donated nine ceramics and one watercolor to MHCAM, works that are currently on view in the exhibition 140 Unlimited: Recent Acquisitions in Honor of the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum’s 140th Anniversary. 

  • Museum Preparator Jacqueline Finnegan installs vinyl
    Storage Segments

    The Not So Lazy Days of Summer

    This week MHCAM reopens to the public after almost three months of installations. Associate Curator Hannah Blunt provides a brief overview of what has been happening behind the scenes, and what visitors will discover in the re-installed galleries. 

  • Hendrick Andriessen (Flemish, 1607-1655), Vanitas Still Life (detail), ca. 1650
    Intern Insights

    Death, Love, and Resurrection

    Self-guided tour, one of MHCAM Journeys, developed for visitors in Summer 2016

  • Maker Unknown (Apsáalooke, Crow), Woman's saddle with stirrups (detail), late 19th or early 20th century
    Intern Insights

    In the Details

    Self-guided tour, one of MHCAM Journeys, developed for visitors in Summer 2016

  • Joseph Allen Skinner Museum
    Objects of Our Affection

    Skinner Weird

    Last month, a blogger for OnlyInYourState.com deemed Mount Holyoke’s Joseph Allen Skinner Museum the number one weirdest place in Massachusetts. Aaron F. Miller, MHCAM’s Associate Curator of Visual and Material Culture, takes the opportunity to explore the top 10 weirdest objects in the Skinner Museum collection. A mummified wedding cake? A Teddy Roosevelt nutcracker? Read on to learn about these wondrous oddities!

  • Kymberly Newberry ’16, Kimberly Grenade ’16, Fatima Cadet-Diaby ’16, Aladrianne Young ’16, Chrislyn Laurore ’16, Tara Gabriel-Richards ’16, and Natalie Riquelmy ’16
    Uncategorized

    Africana Studies at the Art Museum

    On April 20, 2016, MHCAM hosted “Africana Studies at the Art Museum,” an event organized by Aladrianne Young ’16. An Africana Studies major and a receptionist at the Museum for three years, Aladrianne became interested in representations of diversity in academia and the art world. She conceived of this brilliantly successful event in order to explore issues of racial and gender identity, oppression, and history through artworks drawn almost exclusively from the MHCAM collection. Aladrianne recruited six student presenters to share their research, poetry, and personal anecdotes about works by Faith Ringgold, Kehinde Wiley, Alison Saar, and Shirin Neshat.

  • Utagawa Hiroshige II, Ise Futami ga ura (detail), 1859; Emily Ewen '16 presents her installation of Japanese prints in the Carson Teaching Gallery
    Storage Segments

    A Collective Experience

    Art History and English major Emily Ewen ’16 discusses a major project she undertook this spring reorganizing more than 550 Japanese ukiyo-e prints in the MHCAM collection. The vast collection inspired Ewen to pursue an independent study through the Art History department, allowing her to complement her tireless physical work on the collection with academic research. 

  • Teaching with Art

    Confessions of a Museum Guide

    Medieval studies major and public history minor Kristina Bush ’17 shares her experience as a participant in MHCAM’s new Student Guide Program. Reflecting on two semesters of weekly meetings at the Museum, field trips, research, and tour training, Kristina writes, “I feel as if I have found my place at Mount Holyoke in the Student Guide Program.” 

  • Rosamond Wolff Purcell (American, b. 1942), Passenger Pigeon (detail), 2008 capture; 2013 print
    Objects of Our Affection

    Passenger Pigeon

    In 2008, Boston-based photographer Rosamond Wolff Purcell made a series of images of natural history specimens at the Western Foundation of Vertebrate Zoology in California. In the newest installment of the mhcameo series Objects of Our Affection, Professor of English Elizabeth Young discusses one photograph from that series, Purcell’s beautiful, beguiling Passenger Pigeon. Young describes her recent immersion in the mysterious world of taxidermy, and recounts the fascinating history of the now-extinct passenger pigeon. 

  • Storage Segments

    Textile Tactics

    Museum Preparator Jacqueline Finnegan reflects on the labor-intensive process of preparing textiles for exhibition. Thanks to her meticulous use of needle, thread, and Velcro®, the textiles in the current exhibition, Dancers of the Nightway: Ceremonial Themes in Navajo Weaving, seem to hover off the wall.  

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